9 Obvious Signs a Girl Likes You (In Person, Over Text ...

So another round one, chapter 90. Only 10 to go for the big number, this actually also marks 1000 novel size pages of story-making just over 277.000 words thus far O_o For comparison, the lord of the rings is 576.000 so damn near halfway there... Holy fuck that is a lot of writing in just over three months. To mark the occasion this one is a special one. at some point, during today's story, there is going to be a fade to black and a little link (If you are speed machines please have patients it's coming ASAP)
Now in there, you will find nothing but gratuitous pancake, this is so that you have the choice, you may skip the standalone chapter and I promise you are not missing any of the actual story, at least as little as I could manage. for the rest of you Enjoy,
With the semantics out of the way, I say we get on with the story,
ko-fi For having more pretty pictures commissioned.
Sapphire
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Chapter 90: A Bad Night
Luke had returned with a gaggle of kids, who all looked rather overwhelmed by what they saw coming out. There were a lot of them, Tom counted twelve in total. All of them rather young; he guessed the oldest one looked about nine.
“Look, dragon!” a young boy shouted, running over to Jarix with a few others on his heels. Some were looking around, clearly searching for people who might not be here anymore. Others stood staring at Tom.
The sight of other kids also caused a fair amount of excitement, Luke ushering the more timid kids towards the ones from Hylsdal.
Tom just stood there putting a hand around Jacky’s waist, looking at the best reason for doing all this. He chuckled as Jarix elevated his head just out of grabbing range as the more excitable of the kids tried to touch his face. He had a smile on though, even if he looked a little unsure of what to do. Zarko was on hand to help though, telling off the kids who tried to climb up the wounded dragon.
It took some coaxing, but in the end, most of the kids had been convinced to start playing with each other, though some were still around sitting either crying or just keeping to themselves. Lothal was doing his best to try and console his friends and doing a remarkably good job of it. Tom couldn't decide if he was proud or sad at seeing an eleven-year-old acting like an adult.
Dinner was nothing special, just some more of the stew from earlier with some rather stale tasting bread. Jacky, Tom, Zarko, and Unkai had sat together with the lady, Luke, Requi and the healer who was sort of conscious for the moment. She was apparently called Quin, at least for short. Unkai too was sitting rather slack-eared, clearly having been put to hard work already.
Jarix was given some cuts of cured meat. The lady had brought out both some decent ale and even some wine, which was passed around the table. Tom had never tried dragonette wine before, so, despite his reservations about mixing alcohol with blood loss, he poured a cup for himself. That was an old student tactic, after all, to donate blood before a night on the town. It made things a bit cheaper.
“We might not be able to put together a feast, but we can do this, a small token of thanks. Luke, if you wouldn’t mind,” The Lady went as she took her seat, Luke standing up raising a glass.
“To the heroes in our hour of need!”
Tom damn near stood up to join Luke, Zarko grabbing him by the shoulder to keep him seated. As the assembled dragonettes of the keep gave a toast. Tom didn’t really know if he felt proud or just uncomfortable at this point. On one hand, he could look around the room to see many faces, most of which appeared happy. On the other hand, many definitely weren’t: a lone wounded father with a sobbing kid; the kids from Hylsdal; the countless wounded, some looking like they might not fly or even walk properly again.
“To the crazy bastard who made it possible,” Jackalope went as she raised her cup looking at Tom, apparently figuring out what was being toasted.
“Hey!” Jarix let out, clearly trying to sound offended. “To the crazy bastards who made it possible,” Zarko corrected, raising her cup.
“To wiping those fuckers off the map,” Tom joined in, feeling a little left out.
“Cheers to that,” The silvered huntress replied without much enthusiasm, slamming her drink down in one go. She was joined by the others. Tom took his time with his wine though. As expected it was rather sweet, definitely not bad though. They hadn’t made a huge thing out of the meal, it was just stew and bread after all, even if their drinks were well above average.
It had been a rather awkward meal though. Jackalope couldn’t partake in the conversation unless Tom or someone else wrote down for her what was going on. They all did their best to avoid the more depressing subject matters, but it was pretty damn hard to avoid them in their current state. Quite a few of the others had taken to drinking rather heavily. Tom could hardly blame them, but he kept it mild for now. Jacky, though, did make a dent in the ale supply. She didn’t get piss drunk, but she was definitely inebriated by now.
“You know, I’ve never been called a hero before,” Jacky went, leaning on Tom after they had finished the meal. “You still got the ace though… You always get the ace… Why are you so damn good at killing?” She questioned hanging on his shoulders.
Tom didn’t really know how to answer her on that one. “You know what,” She went, pulling back and poking him in the chest with a finger. “You get to teach me how. You’re not getting the ace next time,” Tom pondered for a second if that was a smart thing to agree to. It was likely going to happen though, so why not.
“I guess that’s the smart part about being deaf, I can’t hear if you're protesting, so I’m just gonna say you agreed,” Jackalope continued before he managed to nod his reply. She poured a fresh mug for the both of them, snickering. Tom debated getting out the notepad to try and tell her he needed to be a little careful when it came to alcohol right now. She beat him to it though. “You’re not drinking like last time; afraid we might do something stupid?”
Unkai damn near choked at that one. Zarko just shook her head, looking a tad embarrassed. ’Remember the angry smith Tom, Remember the angry smith,’ he repeated to himself. He got out the notepad to write down a response. Tom made well sure no one else saw what he wrote as he showed it to Jacky.
“I’m wounded, also your mother,” she pulled back a bit, looking a little annoyed.
“She is not here nor will she be... Hey Unkai! Can you give him a check? He claims to be wounded; I don’t want him dying on me.” She went, sounding entirely inappropriate.
Even Zarko had to suppress a slight laugh at that, Unkai looking like a deer in the headlights as Jacky’s attention switched to him.
“I mean sure. I’ll just finish this,” the healer replied, gesturing at his cup.
“I can’t hear you,” Jackalope reiterated with a side to side head bob. Unkai looked very embarrassed, just giving her a thumbs up instead.
‘Oh boy,’ Tom thought to himself, shrinking down.
“I think he needs more liquid courage to handle me though. Watch closely Unkai, you might learn how to grow a spine. Even if it’s only for a bit,” Jackalope continued, laughing at her own joke as she poured another drink for herself and refilling Tom’s cup.
“The man who went toe to toe with a small army and he needs help to handle you. What does that tell you?” Zarko let out, looking at Tom, seeming very pleased with herself.
“Don’t let them get to you Tom, you're braver than her,” Jarix added, ensuring that everyone in the entire hall was now invested in the conversation.
Tom just picked up the mug of ale she had poured for him. Jackalope excitedly raised hers as they knocked them together. ‘May the hangover have mercy on my soul,’ Tom thought to himself. He had been saved after a few mugs by the lady declaring that they needed to save enough for a proper feast when they could manage it.
The result was a nice buzz and an even cockier Jackalope as they left the table. Perhaps it was her time for some healing following that whole shit show. He had never seen her as distraught as she was at Hylsdal. Not to mention the expression on her face when Zarko had carried the body of the dead girl away after they landed.
Apparently, alcohol had at the very least helped her think about something else, as she was spouting funny stories and, of course, boasting about how amazing she had been in the battle. That had led to a hasty explanation about how Tom had let her borrow some of his power during the battle. He wasn’t entirely sure if any of the locals bought it, but they were way too polite to question the explanation though. Or possibly scared, or just didn’t care, he wasn’t quite sure.
Unkai had gone over Jackalope first and deemed her as fixed as she could be right now; he didn't dare try to fix her ears, claiming that to be way beyond him. He sounded confident that Nunuk might be able to put them back together again though. Jackalope let out an annoyed sigh at the news, though the part about Nunuk did help.
It was clear Jacky and Tom had received priority when it came to getting fixed up after the battle. Unkai had put in some work on Tom, mainly putting his effort into the stinger wound on his side. Tom had him check his neck wound as thoroughly as he could manage. But Unkai claimed that was as good as it was going to get, though he recommended some resting time.
“Fuck, I took painkillers earlier,” Tom let out as Unkai touched the stinger wound, which didn’t hurt as much as it should have.
“Is that bad?” Unkai had questioned, looking at the wound.
“I drank alcohol too, you're not supposed to mix those.” Unkai looked at Tom as if he was expecting more than that.
“Well don’t look at me, I don’t know how they work,” he finally responded, Jackalope’s face growing worried at the exchange, her gaze breaking as she looked to Unkai.
“He’s fine, right? He’s been stung before. He’s tough on that front even if his skin is soft like a kid’s,” She asked with worry in her voice slurring slightly, Tom taking slight offense at the last part. Unkai turned to her, giving her a thumbs up and a smile before looking back at the wound.
“Anything we can do about it?” the healer questioned, clearly trying to not look worried this time, for Jacky’s sake.
“Don’t think so. I guess I’m just gonna cross my fingers and wait it out,” Tom answered truthfully. He had no clue what the actual effect of that might be. He felt fine though. He was a little weird in the head, but that was honestly to be expected in his current condition.
“Well I don’t think you’re gonna be sleeping alone anyway, but consider it medical advice to have someone look after you,” Unkai replied trying a sly smile, which just looked wrong on him.
“Tom the hot stone reporting for duty,” Tom joked back as Unkai went about reapplying the bandage to the wound. Jacky’s gaze switching back to Tom seemingly excited, the edges of her mouth curling into a slight smile.
The young woman who had washed his clothes earlier had shown them up to the bedrooms after the quick check-up.
“We have a few rooms which weren’t in use before, don’t worry it’s not… someones. I'm sorry if they are dirty, but you can have one each if you want.” She sounded really rather uncomfortable. Tom could get why. He could see the number of rooms and there had to be at least a few that had owners until recently.
“This is very kind of you. Thank you,” Tom replied, the woman giving a curtsy before making her way back down the stairs rather hurriedly. Tom got out the notepad to ask Jacky if she wanted to share a room. Thinking back, that wasn’t at all necessary; he just felt like it was the right thing to at least ask.
Jackalope though didn’t bother to ask him. Taking him by the wrist rather firmly, she led him into the first room the young woman had shown them.

The Pancake Chapter: Pancake!
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Balethon now safely in her grasp, Sapphire circled back the way she came. She almost wanted to tell him to enjoy this since she was likely not gonna be carrying him again, not to mention at night in nothing but her underwear. The dude had already had a remarkably shitty night though, so she refrained.
She spotted the large disorganized group which had been supposed to keep the tavern safe. They had set down in a square and were looking around confused as Sapphire came in to land. She was quickly greeted by a near-hysterical Haiko who looked ready to drop his mace as he nearly trod on Balethon in an attempt to hug her faster.
“You’re okay, right? Nothing wrong?”
“I’m fine, the bastards couldn’t shoot.”
“Oh thank whoever cared,” he let out, squeezing her tightly.
“Where is Dakota?” Sapphire squeaked out from his embrace. He let go of her taking a step back looking around.
“Not here. Neither is that Maiko guy, and he damn near caught up to you before you shot off into the darkness. You haven't gotten any slower, have you now?”
“Not by much, no,” she replied, looking down to her stricken cargo. “Let’s get him to sit up somewhere. Any of you got some water?” she questioned, looking to the other guards. Her eyes landed on someone being bound up. She assumed it was the mercenary who had tried to attack her. “You're a shit fighter, I hope you know that,” She shouted out, glaring at the arsehole, who just stared at her with clear contempt.
Draki had come over with a canteen of water, looking up to Sapphire and looking a bit strained in the face before he turned to Haiko.
“I owe you two silver, don’t I?” the diminutive guy asked, seeming rather annoyed.
“I told you, she’s the fastest woman you ever saw,” Haiko replied with a smile, trying to fold out Balethon, eventually giving up. “Grab on, let’s put him on that bench over there,” he went, grabbing Balethon by the legs, with Sapphire taking the shoulders as they carried him over. He was stiff as a board, though the panicked look in his eyes was at least sort of gone.
“You put a bet on me catching them?” Sapphire questioned as set him down. She wasn’t sure if she should be flattered or angry. Haiko held up his hands defensively, shaking his head.
“No no, Draki just didn’t believe all the stories, so I put two silver on the stories being true. Easiest bet ever.” That was more to Sapphire’s liking, and she gave him a slightly wicked smile. “You know we used to get a slice of the bets back then.”
“Hey, I got you your own personal protection service,” He replied, gesturing to the motley collection of dragonettes mulling about the square.
“That’s a word for it, I guess,” Sapphire replied, not overly impressed. It wasn’t like they had done much good tonight. “Take good care of him, I have some questions,” she went, leaving Haiko and going over to the now thoroughly tied up dragonette who had attacked her, the questioning already underway. Someone let out a suggestive growl as she walked by. The fact that she was wearing nothing but her underpants in the middle of the street dawning on her.
“Do that again and I’ll kill you,” she snarled, not sure who the offending member was, before turning her attention to the mercenary. “So… You thought kidnapping one of my friends was a good idea? How well would you say that went?” She questioned looking down at the piece of shit.
“Fucking brilliantly,” he responded angrily. “I ended up with a nice view if nothing else,” he continued with a shit-eating grin.
“How hard may I punch him?” She demanded, looking around at the guards. Most of them just looked confused at each other.
“As hard as I say so,” Maiko bellowed out, coming down alongside Dakota, who was carrying a very large unconscious female dragonette with an arrow sticking out of her back.
“Not your best shot, but it did the trick,” Dakota let out, unceremoniously dumping the dragonette on the ground before setting down. “Tie her up too, she won’t be out forever.”
After a bit they got the both of them tied up at about the same time as a contingent of city guards arrived, demanding to know what was going on. Sapphire cursed the fact she likely wouldn’t be allowed to beat the shit out of them now, as they began asking some very pointed questions.
“Oh yeah sure, a group of armed what was it... Tavern guards? Out at night with a pair of half-naked women and a dude who claims to be Royal Guard. And why has she been shot?!” the lead city guard questioned, looking around at them.
“Because she kidnapped him after stabbing him with vargulf poison,” Sapphire let out, wide armed. “How the fuck is that hard to understand!?”
“Calm down woman, who shot her?” the man questioned pointing at the female mercenary.
“I did and two other pieces of shit who tried to kill us!”
“Right, you're all coming with us. We need to know what happened here. Manacles,” the City Guard replied, snapping his fingers over his shoulder and receiving the item in question. Sapphire’s heart sank; she had never been arrested before. Closest she had ever gotten was being given a stern talking to for sneaking into the training fields.
Dakota looked ready with a reply, when Maiko beat her to it.
“Listen up you little shit-eating ground rat, see what this is?!” He went, holding up his sword, which true to form bore the royal insignia on the crossguard. “I will make a cape out of your fucking wings if you don’t man up and do your fucking job. These bastards attacked a tavern in the middle of the night, attempted murder, managed a kidnapping, then had a go at murder again during the desperate chase to catch them and your useless ass turns up just in time to insult the Royal Guard and be useless.”
“I’m gonna have to ask you to...” the city guard attempted to protest, though seemingly with a growing sense of apprehension.
“No, you may not. You are outranked! Or do I need to get the colonel to inform her the city guard is aiding an enemy of the crown? That would lead to some serious fucking cleansing of your unit, I can assure you of that!”
“In that case, I say we take you to the stockade and send for this colonel of yours, perhaps letting her know someone stole a blade from the Royal Guard armories.” Sapphire expected Maiko to explode at that insult, though he just pulled back with an evil smile.
“Very good sir, let’s go. Though I would appreciate the opportunity to get my uniform before appearing before my superior. You may escort me to the tavern in question if you wish.”
“That can be arranged, I assume you two wouldn’t mind getting dressed either, though I must insist on you accompanying us. Don’t we have a blanket or something?” he asked, looking back to his unit, eventually procuring a pair of thin woolen blankets.
“Bloody brilliant sir, how exactly do we fly with these?” Dakota questioned sounding very unimpressed.
“Uhm…”
As they were getting ready for takeoff Sapphire heard someone get a smack to the back of the head as she moved to check up on Balethon. Looking back, a slightly ashamed looking tavern guard was rubbing the back of his head, a very unimpressed woman standing next to him. ‘God fucking dammit’ she cursed to herself.
The ones who had woken up in the middle of the night broke off, going back to the tavern to get dressed in preparation for a long night. They wanted the bastards interrogated immediately anyway, even if getting interrogated themselves hadn't really been the plan. If this was the work of the Flaxens they would be doing their best to cover their tracks as soon as they learned of the mission's failure, so speed was of the essence.
“Why can’t we just be left in peace!” Dakota snapped as they were getting dressed. “Please let it just be the Flaxens so we can get them dealt with already.”
“Of course it’s them, who else could it be?” Sapphire dismissed her as she strapped on her greaves. Sapphire had a feeling Colonel Hashaw would not take kindly to this attack so she was bound to be there, therefore she needed to look proper in case they got fine company at the stockade.
Maiko had gone on to the Hashaw Estate to report back on the evening’s activities and hopefully convince Victoria to make an appearance. So Sapphire and Dakota found themselves standing in front of the stockade with a city guard escort.
It was a large, ugly building, looking like a place you wanted to avoid at all costs with its rough grey stone and metal barred cell windows lining the walls. “May they rot in here forever,” Sapphire let out as they were shown inside. She and Dakota were taken to different interrogation rooms. They were civil about it though, not even tying her up like she had feared.
The guy who had ‘caught them’ as he claimed was apparently in charge of this case. He formally introduced himself as Sergeant Lanok and set about asking questions, not many of which were intelligent. Where they were from, what they were doing here, why they had an armed escort in the middle of the night despite not even being properly dressed at the time.
He of course didn't believe most of the answers he was getting. Especially the part about being in the employ of the king at the moment, nor the whole Flaxen situation.
“What? You claim to be the target of a kidnapping attempt by a noble family, one on the council at that?! Give me a break,” Sapphire had to fight really hard not to slap him, but she didn’t want to end up in manacles, so she just stared at him contemptuously. Then there was a deep thunk that shook the building followed by creaking wood from above.
“This should be good,” Sapphire let out, leaning back with a smirk, relishing in the confusion on the guy’s face.
It took a bit longer than Sapphire had anticipated, as she refused to answer further questions, but there was eventually a knock on the door, Sergeant Lanok getting up to answer it. He was confronted by a very pissed looking Colonel Hashaw in formal uniform, Maiko and Yilditz at her back.
“You seem to have attempted to arrest one of my men and two people you really shouldn’t have. Not to mention waking both me and a decidedly grumpy 10 ton black dragon currently on your roof.”
‘So it wasn’t Baron then,’ Sapphire concluded. She doubted very much he could have been roused for this anyway, it also made sense to bring a black, they liked the night anyway. Maiko had been decent at laying out a string of insults, but Hashaw was clearly the source of his talent, as she chewed out not only the sergeant but anyone dumb enough to make an objection or not make themselves as small as they could including the captain of the Stockade much to Sapphire's horror.
It definitely helped that she was flanked by Ylditz, the person who had been tasked with finding out who the mercenaries were, as well as a few other family members. The dragon in question was apparently Tiguan, one of Jarix's training buddies. Sapphire guessed he was here just as much for a bit of experience then.
“Is there anyone dumb or useless enough in here to have anything more to say...? Very good. Where are the two who ‘actually’ need questioning?”
The tavern guards had been allowed to go, though Haiko had stuck around. The Sergeant was now looking very small as he took them to the room where the one who hadn’t been shot was sitting. The woman who had been carrying Balethon currently being treated.
“Do you have even the slightest idea how much you fucked up tonight?” Hashaw asked as she strode in the door, the sergeant holding it open for her.
“Pretty fucking badly I presume, but what the hell are you gonna do, huh? Gonna execute me, perhaps clip my wings? Doesn't matter if you’re Royal Guard or tavern guard the punishment is the same. So you don’t scare me woman or should I say… oh, Colonel, wow I really did fuck up, huh?” Well, Sapphire had to give it to him, he was taking the news that he was likely done for rather well, or perhaps he was just in denial about the whole thing.
“Oh, I can do worse than that I think. Sapphire, you wouldn’t happen to have learned a thing or two from our friend?”
“Might have done,” she admitted, thinking back to what she could remember of Tom’s escapades.
“Sergeant, what is the punishment for his crimes?”
“Well, he failed to kill anyone, hence he is charged with attempted murder and attempted kidnapping. So indentured servitude for quite a while. Unless he could pay for a prison sentence of course.”
“Right then, how about this? Tell me who sent you and I will pay for your prison time,” the colonel then went, looking to the perp. “I know you were hired to do this, so while you may be a piece of shit it’s not you that I want. Alternatively, I could start pulling strings until we get some alone time with you and make your life really fucking unpleasant.”
Sapphire looked slightly nervously to the sergeant, but he was still cowering, so she guessed Hashaw got away with threatening to break the law inside the stockade. It was a generous offer too. If this guy was going away for a long time, paying for it wasn’t gonna be cheap.
“You know my choice is death or slavery here. You can’t be dumb enough to believe they will let me live if I talk.”
“That depends on who sent you, because if it is who I think it is they won't be around to send someone to kill you after this.” Again Sapphire was fairly sure they couldn't condemn the entire Flaxen family for something like this, but hey if it works it works.
“You seriously think we take jobs directly? It’s not the client that will kill me dipshit. My boss would.” Hashaw was very clearly not pleased with that answer, as she turned to the sergeant.
“Would you agree this man is guilty, on the word of both independent tavern guards, the Royal Guard, and our two huntresses of the noble Bizmati Keep? Or do you insist on a mock trial for this piece of shit?”
The sergeant looked a tad bewildered for a second before nodding. “Yes ma’am. I’ll have him sent off to the deepest mine I can find tomorrow.”
“No, I want him handed over to the Royal Guard so we may question him as an enemy combatant.”
“You cannot do that and you know it,” the sergeant replied, finally standing up for himself. Clearly to Hashaw’s great annoyance.
“Then I want you to get me a telepath. Am I correct in assuming his rights on that matter are no longer in place even if I can’t pull his claws out?”
“Yes, but we don’t have one, ma’am. You must understand, a criminal’s mind is not exactly the kindest place to be.”
“Weak-minded cowards,” Hashaw cursed, looking away pondering. “Fine keep him here, you may continue with your excuse for questioning. I’ll be back, luckily not everyone is as weak of spine.”
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So then We have prisoners to work with once again. hopefully, they will fare a little better than the last one. then again... Maybe not. As always do let me know what you thought down below be it good bad or just generally hilarious.
until next time, have an awesome day.

ko-fi For having more pretty pictures commissioned.
Sapphire
Wiki Discord
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Just in case you missed it, the pancake chapter: Pancake!

As a child psychologist, I've worked with some pretty exceptional patients. Maria was the first.

I was young then, new to the career, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. Maria’s parents had contacted me, stating that their seven-year-old daughter was ‘possessed’ and when I questioned further, they simply told me she ‘isn’t normal’ and ‘needs fixing’.
I didn’t like to do home visits, because a ‘neutral’ space is important to the therapeutic relationship. Nevertheless, it was sometimes a necessary evil. When I’d asked for her to be brought into the office, her parents had told me that it was too risky. I accepted, partly out of curiosity and partly because I was glad, for the little girl’s sake, that her parents had called for a psychologist and not an exorcist.
They lived in the rich part of town. Shiny, identical rows of houses lined the leafy, suburban streets. Maria’s parents greeted me at the door solemnly. They had an air of elegance about them, and I couldn’t help but notice that their clothes probably cost more than my car.
“We should warn you, Doctor-” Mr. McMahon said.
“No need for doctor,” I interrupted. “You can call me Jack.” They exchanged worried glances with each other, clearly concerned about the validity of my credentials.
“Well, Jack…” he said, clearing his throat and straightening his tie. “She’s dangerous.”
“I’d love to meet her,” I said, hoping to diffuse the tension. They beckoned me inside. Their house looked like a show home. In fact, until I was pushed into Maria’s bedroom, the house displayed no signs that anyone, let alone a child, lived in it at all.
Her bedroom was tiny. In a house like theirs, the room seemed like something that had been intended as a closet rather than a bedroom. It felt like the walls might close in on us at any moment. It was strangely bare for a kid’s room; No pictures or posters on the walls. A lone stuffed animal on the bed. Maria sat in front of a dollhouse on the floor, which, judging from the worn and broken edges, had been inherited. There was little space for anything else.
While her parents were well-presented, Maria, in contrast, looked scruffy and unkempt. Her hair was matted and her socks were too big for her, hanging off her feet. She didn’t even look up at me as I entered.
“Hi Maria. I’m Jack. Do you mind if I join you?”
“Ok,” she said, still avoiding eye contact.
Usually, this was when the child asked why I was there but Maria did not seem to care either way. She delicately held a doll between her thumb and index finger and moved it side to side, making it bounce exaggeratedly as she walked it around the dollhouse. She whispered animatedly under her breath.
“Do you mind if I join you?” I asked.
“If you want to.” She scooted over slightly. It wasn’t easy to fit on the floor next to her, and I had to sit awkwardly, with my knees up. I felt a prickle of irritation at the parents, who, after refusing to bring her into the office, could at least have given us somewhere more suitable in their stately home to work.
“Who is this?” I asked, tentatively reaching in and picking up one of the dolls lay carefully on the dollhouse floor.
“Her name is Barbara,” she said. “She likes to sing. And my doll here is called Sandy.”
I sang, “la la la” in a high-pitched voice and she giggled. “How are you, Sandy?” I said, as Barbara.
“I’m good. I love to sing too!” she made Sandy say. We sang a tuneless ‘la-la-la’ together and she cackled.
I liked to spend the first session getting to know the child and building a rapport. I’d brought some games of my own, but nothing could compete with her beloved dollhouse, so we quickly returned to that.
“Do you know why your parents asked me to come to visit you today, Maria?” I said.
“Yes. You’re a doctor for fixing people’s heads. But my head is happy. I think you should see Mammy and Daddy instead.”
“What do you mean? Are their feelings not happy?”
“No.”
“Why is that, do you think?”
“Because I was born.”
“You think your parents are unhappy that you were born?”
“That freak ain’t no daughter of mine” she said, in an uncanny impression of her father’s voice. “That’s what Daddy says.”
“How did you feel hearing your Daddy say that?” I asked.
She shrugged.
“I think if someone said that to me I would have some pretty big feelings about it.”
She shrugged again. “He says I have evil in me. He says those things since forever,” she said dismissively, as if that made it ok.
I looked around at the room we were in. It was like she had been shoved in the corner of the house, out of sight, out of mind. Everything else was so fancy, so expensive, so gaudy. Then here she was, shoved in a tiny little closet with only a broken dollhouse to play with.
“What about your Mammy?”
“She says I’m her punishment. From God. For her sins. Hey, Barbara and Sandy want to go to the zoo now.”
I grabbed Barbara, sat her down in an imaginary car, and circled the house twice before stopping at the ‘zoo’. Maria spent a while discussing Sandy’s favourite zoo animals, and I made Barbara share hers in return.
“Why don’t you tell me about what you do together? With your mammy and daddy?”
“We don’t do things together, silly.” she laughed. “I play dolls. They don’t play dolls because they’re grown-ups.”
“Yes but sometimes grown-ups still play games with kids.”
“Well, you’re the first one I seen.”
“Well do you ever go out anywhere together? Maybe to the park? Or watch movies together?”
“Mammy doesn’t let me watch movies. She says I don’t need ideas put in my head.”
“What do you think she means by that?”
She shrugged again. “Sandy wants some tea now. Does Barbara want some too?”
By the end of the session, I’d seen no indication that Maria was anything but a normal and sweet little girl. She displayed a normal level of empathy for her age, had a good imagination, and the only surprising thing was how she wasn’t more obviously damaged from years of being told she was a ‘freak’ by two parents who, frankly, seemed to dislike the child.
I’d arranged to meet with her parents after the session, and they were eager for a diagnosis.
“Can you fix her, Doctor Jack?” said her dad.
“Mr. and Mrs. McMahon, if it’s okay, I would first like to hear more about why you asked me to come here today. As I said on the phone, I would have liked to meet you both first and have a conversation, before I met with Maria, to see what problems you think she is facing.”
“Well, you should know that! Didn’t you do tests and things on her?” her Dad said. “What kind of shrink are you?”
“It’s not really as simple as doing a scan or a blood test. We have only had one session. So far, she seems like a very pleasant little girl. And quite a happy one too, all things considered. But of course, I can’t get to know everything about her in just one-”
“All things considered?” he said.
“Well, I mean considering the things she hears you say about her.”
“Well, she hears nothing that ain’t true. God help me, we would never lie to the girl and pretend there was nothing wrong. We ain’t those kinda parents,” said Mrs. McMahon. I didn’t know what to say to that, so I paused to gather my thoughts. “It’s not her fault she’s got the devil in her. The fault is all mine. I was a different person in my past. I did some things I am ashamed of. And now, this is my punishment,” she continued.
“We just want a normal daughter,” said her dad. “I was told you can fix kids who have things wrong with them. So that’s what you’re gonna do. We’re paying you good money for it too.”
“What I am saying, with all due respect, is that when a child hears comments like that, every day, it can really-“ I said.
“I told you, Judy. I told you he’d blame us. And you’re making it worse, with all that talk about your sins. We’re good people and we deserve a good kid. Now, are you going to keep insulting our parenting, or are you gonna make her right?”
“Can you give some examples of the behaviors you’ve seen that have caused you concern?”
“I don’t know what’s wrong with her, or how she… Isn’t that your job? To find out? You want us to do your job? What do you think the problem is, Jack?”
“Please, Mr. McMahon. If you could just-“
“He’s a quack, Judy. I told you. I told you, we should have gone to the priest.”
“I wonder if maybe family therapy would be a good option for you and-“
“Here,” he said, pulling out his wallet and throwing money at me. “You are not welcome inside our house again. Call the priest, Judy.”
I contacted the authorities, as was my duty to, but considering she was fed, clothed and appeared on the outside to have a good life, it was unlikely anything would be done. Considering the dire situations that a lot of children were in, Maria would likely slip under the radar.
It surprised me when a phone call came from Maria’s dad, two days later. Apparently, Maria had requested for me to come back. Believing that I must be doing something right after all, since ‘she is a horrible child to everyone else,’ her dad wanted me to return the following week. He agreed that, if after another home visit I still believed it safe, he would bring her into the office for future appointments.
I arrived again the following week and rang the doorbell, but this time, it was Maria herself who answered. She grinned when she saw me.
“Hi Doctor Jack,” she said.
“Hi Maria. Are your parents home?”
“Aren’t you here to play with me?”
“Yes we will have our session soon but I’d first like to speak with them.”
“They were angry after you left last time,” she said.
“I’m sorry. I hope they weren’t angry with you.”
“They’re always angry with me,” she said. “But this time they were angry with you too.”
She grabbed me by the hand and pulled me towards her room. Her parents were nowhere to be seen, or heard. In fact, the house seemed empty. “Maria, are you home alone?”
“They’re sleeping,” she said.
“So who is looking after you?”
“I’m not a baby,” she said.
“I know you’re not a baby, but it’s important I speak with your parents and so I would like to wake them up.”
“We can’t wake them up,” she said.
“I understand that they’re tired, but-“
“They’re not here,” she finally said.
“How long have they been gone for? Do they often leave you home alone, Maria?”
“Are you coming or not?” she said impatiently.
“I’ll be in in a minute. I just need to call someone first.”
I walked around their house and checked in each and every room, which took a while, but they were not there anywhere. I called the authorities once more and they agreed to send a social worker.
“So are we playing dolls again this week while we talk?” I asked her as I walked into her room.
She jumped, startled, as if she’d forgotten I was there, and slammed the door of her dollhouse closed. “No. Sandy and Barbara don’t want to play.”
“That’s a shame,” I said. “I thought I could say hello to them.”
“No, you can’t,” she said sternly. “They’re sleeping. Where are your games? Did you bring some?”
I pulled out some puppets that were often a hit with younger children. One of them was a bear named Barney and the other a dinosaur named Rex.
“Can Rex breathe fire?” she said.
“No, Rex is a dinosaur. Maybe you’re thinking of dragons. Would you like to pretend Rex is a dragon?”
“Dragons aren’t real,” she said.
“No, but sometimes when we play it’s just pretend.”
“Am I sick?” she said.
“Do you feel sick?”
“You’re a brain doctor. Is something wrong with my brain? Is that why I’m a freak?”
“I don’t think you’re a freak,” I said. “I know you’ve heard some things that must have been upsetting from your parents, but I don’t think that. They told me you wanted me to come back, and so I am happy to be here and talk to you. Is there anything you’d like to talk about today? It can be anything you like.”
“No. I just liked playing.”
“I’d like to find out more about you. Do you have any friends? From school?”
“I don’t go to school.”
I frowned. I hadn’t been made aware of that. “So you’re home-schooled?”
“What does that mean?”
“Your parents teach you at home? Or someone else?”
“They taught me to read,” she said. “They said I was really stupid because I couldn’t do it for so long but now I can. And I can tell the time. It’s two thirty.”
It was six fifteen.
“So does anyone else come, to give you lessons?” I asked.
“No. People don’t come here. Nobody can visit because I might hurt them.”
“Do you ever hurt people?” I said.
“I don’t like hurting people,” she replied.
“Sometimes we don’t mean to. Sometimes we do things when we are feeling angry and upset. Has anything like that ever happened to you?”
She shrugged. “If someone makes me angry I just make them be different.”
“How do you do that?”
She stopped and looked at me, her gaze penetrating. I stared back with the same intensity. Eventually, she relented. “Ok, but it’s a secret. You can’t tell anyone.”
“There are some things I have to tell. To keep you safe. But if it’s not one of those things, I won’t tell anyone,” I explained.
“Like how you called the lady before you came in here? And told her my parents weren’t here? I heard you.”
“Yes, like that. Children can’t be at home on their own, so someone needs to be with you until your parents come home. And then they will need to talk to your parents about what happened.”
“But they are home,” she said.
“I couldn’t see them anywhere. Could you tell me where they are?”
“They’re sleeping,” she said.
“I didn’t see them in their bedroom,”
“No, not there.” I noticed then that silent tears were streaming down her face. “I wanted them to play with me. Like how you played with me. You said grown-ups did that sometimes. But they didn’t want to.”
She reached behind her and opened the door to her dollhouse carefully, not taking her eyes off me. Inside, there were two brand new dolls, and they were exact replicas of Mr. and Mrs. McMahon.
Unlike her other dolls, these two were moving. The doll of Mr. McMahon was pacing around the dollhouse kitchen angrily and was looking up at both of us, his mouth moving, although I couldn’t hear any sound.
I blinked, hard, unable to believe my eyes. “Can I?” I asked, reaching my hand out. She nodded. I picked up the doll of Mrs. McMahon, who until then had been crouched behind the miniature couch, shaking in fear.
I lifted it out carefully. Every single detail was accurate. Her clothes, her face, her hair. It was like they were, in fact, not dolls at all, but they had been shrunk and placed in the dollhouse.
I picked up Mr. McMahon with my other hand, and I noticed he was trying to claw and bite at me to get away. I gripped him firmly around the waist.
“Maria, what are...?” I started, but I trailed off. I didn’t even know how to finish the sentence.
My heart raced. I just sat there, dolls in my hands, staring at them, nonplussed. My head told me that this must just be an impressive trick, but every cell in my body told me that was not true.
I turned my eyes to Maria, who was looking back at me, acutely aware of my reaction.
When I turned my attention back to the dolls, I realized something even more horrifying was happening. Mr. McMahon, who had been squirming and wiggling, was starting to slow down, as though his body was seizing up.
Mrs. McMahon, who had been watching him from my other hand, started fighting to get to him. I switched quickly so they were both in the same hand and they grasped onto each other for dear life.
Horror struck me as I realized that their movement was continuing to slow, until finally, they were frozen in place, completely paralyzed, except for their eyes, which were frantically darting back and forth.
The texture of their skin changed, turning to smooth plastic, until they lay there in my hands, their cold, lifeless eyes stuck staring straight ahead. They were indistinguishable now from any other children’s doll.
My heart raced. Had they died? Were they still in there, underneath? Maria did not look concerned at all. In fact, she looked rather impressed with herself.
“Maria, did you do this?“
“Now I can play with Mammy and Daddy any time I want.”
She snatched them from me and held them both out in front of her in her tiny fists.
“Ain’t Maria such a freak?” she said, imitating her father's voice, as she moved the doll of him up and down animatedly.
“Yeah, we should never have had her,” she said, mocking her mother. “Let’s make a new kid.”
Then, she started aggressively bashing their heads together as she made kissing noises.
“Maria,” I pleaded, pulling her arms apart gently.
“It’s ok,” she said. “They’re just sleeping.”
She was nonchalant when the social workers turned up and told her that she would need to go with them. Naturally, they assumed she’d been abandoned, left home alone. They tried to contact her parents, but of course, it failed. They assured me that they would keep trying and would also reach out to other family members, but I already knew from my phone conversation with Mr. McMahon that she had no other family.
“Do you want to take your dolls with you, Maria?” said one of the social workers. “Then you have something to play with?”
“No,” she said casually, and dropped them both on their heads, without a second thought. She grabbed the social worker’s hand and followed her out, into the car.
I scooped up the dolls of Mr. and Mrs. McMahon before I left.
“You’re taking the girl’s dolls?” the other social worker said suspiciously.
“No, they’re mine,” I lied. “From my office.”
I have kept the ‘dolls’ to this day. They’re hidden away, where nobody will find them, but I still take them down every now and then. I’ve tried to contact Maria several times throughout the years, but have come across a lot of dead ends.
I still keep them in the hope that one day I will either find her, or find someone who can change them back. I don’t know if they are even still alive in there. If they are, I can’t imagine what they’ve been through all these years.
And although my heart aches for them, sometimes, when I return them to their shelf, I can’t help but think that maybe it was for the best. Maybe Maria was better off without them. And to this day, I wonder whether I overlooked something.
Should I have scooped up Sandy and Barbara too?
Part 2 - Leanne

Lung's reputation, fanon vs canon

I recently ended up doing some reading regarding Lung's reputation, in part because of a piece of fanfic I read, and in part so that I could characterise him for a work I've been planning. I was aware that fanfic tends to exaggerate Lung's reputation (The phrase "Dragon of Kyushu" is entirely fanon - Your average person in Brockton Bay has no idea that Lung fought Leviathan), but I hadn't realised how bad it was.
My actual read, having done some skimming for Lung's appearances, and discussions about him, is that Lung is, if anything, massively underestimated by the population of Brockton Bay. I'm kind of just throwing this out there so that someone can shout out if I've gone too far the other way, because there's no easier way to get information than being wrong on the internet.
Taylor serves as our 'Joe Public' character for parahumans. She's pretty ignorant on the cape scene (She didn't really think about how Armsmaster was a Tinker until she was talking to him) and she needed Trigger events explained. As a general rule of thumb, it seems safe to take her as somewhat representative of the general public. And how does she rate Lung?

How was this monster not an A-Lister?

Taylor definitely doesn't think much of Lung. When she first encounters him, she's explicit that she doesn't consider him an A-lister. But what's interesting is that she actually uses this terminology elsewhere. Uber and Leet get described as 'barely even' B-list. Grue and Bitch were 'marginally successful B-list villains'. That seems to be the tier that Lung gets sorted into. He's a villain she's heard about, and the leader of a big gang, but she doesn't seem to treat him as a big deal, personally. She's shocked by how powerful Lung is when Lung is only about 8 feet tall. That's nothing compared to his actual potential, and it's still more than she expected him to be capable of.
The PRT & Protectorate don't seem to view Lung that highly, either, despite numerous fanfics depicting Armsmaster or the Wards expressing shock that Taylor took him out. Officially, he's a Brute 4-9, which means that they think he can be defeated by a squad of troopers, so long as they do it at the start of a fight. He's officially not even worth sending parahumans up against if he's not already ramped up.
And the villain scene don't seem to respect him that much either. In the confrontation in Hive, we see Kaiser use his power to lock himself, Fenja and Menja into a building with Lung, with the intent of killing him. That seems to be going pretty well, because Lung tears down a wall to escape, and stumbles on to Skitter. Once he does, Kaiser refuses help from Skitter

“Step down, Undersider,” Kaiser spoke from the opposite end of the room, “My girls and I have this in hand.”

That's a level of confidence that is entirely incongruous with fanon Lung. At this point, Lung is 15 feet tall, he's got wings and he's almost definitely the second most powerful parahuman in the Bay in a straight fight (Beaten only by Noelle), and Kaiser (who is meant to be a smart guy, IIRC) still thinks he can take him.
But then, the Undersiders don't seem all that scared of him either. Fanfic likes to present them as desperate in the face of Lung coming at them, but that's not really the vibe you get from the actual text.

“When we got word Lung was aiming to come after us tonight, we were pretty freaked. We were arguing strategy for the better part of the day. We eventually decided, fuck it, we’d meet him halfway. Wing it. Not my usual way of doing things, but yeah.”

That doesn't read terrified to me. "Pretty freaked" is still relatively mild if Lung is treated as a massive deal. And, at the end of the day, their plan was for a team with only one heavy hitter to fight him.

"Anyways, point of this explanation is this: Knowing we had an imminent fight with Lung coming, knowing Lung planned to pyrokinesis our general area until he rooted us out, got civilians to finger us or brought in enough capes to make life difficult for us, I called Coil. He said he’d help, told us to wait five minutes, then take the more direct route, straight into the heart of ABB territory. We go, we take out a contingent of ABB gangbangers and scare off Oni Lee. Then I get a call back from Coil. The other reality? We left earlier, went a different route. Got in a fight with Lung before you showed. You decided to attack both our groups while we were occupied fighting each other, worn out, only Lung was stronger at that time, too strong for you to do too much. By the time you realized you’d have to work with us to stop him, which wasn’t long, it was too late. Lung was too tough."

There's two interesting bits in here. One, Lung would need to 'bring in' capes to make it difficult for the Undersiders. Lisa doesn't think he's enough on his own, apparently. Two, Coil didn't use his power to help them escape. He used it aggressively. At least one split was dedicated to two separate attack plans. And sure, maybe he gave them an escape route after closing the first timeline, but I think it's telling that he was willing to use his power and the Undersiders so aggressively. If he thought they were entirely outmatched, a 5 minute head start doesn't seem like enough.
His record is also not as clear as fanfic tends to make it. We know from Ward that he managed to beat the local Protectorate team, with 10-15 minutes build-up time. But, we're also told that he's been beaten repeatedly.

According to the wiki, Lung had apparently suffered a number of minor defeats at the hands of various teams, ranging from the Guild to the local teams of New Wave, the Wards and the Protectorate, but consistently managed to evade capture until last night.

I'm interested in hearing more about him being beaten by New Wave, the Wards and the Protectorate. Is that all at once? Or is it that he's been run off by the Wards on their own at some point?
There's a comment from Wildbow that emphasises his low ambition:

Lung has a high classification but a relatively low level of ambition. He had one powered minion (until early 2011 when he recruited Bakuda) and sought primarily to hold the docks as his territory. He ruled like a lesser king, had prostitutes and sex slaves, a protection racket and drug dealing, but he wasn’t fighting for a footing downtown.
For all his (potential) power, he’d settled into a role as a street thug and gang leader.

Overall, my conclusion is that Lung is vastly more powerful than Brockton Bay gives him credit for, but because he sticks to the poorer areas of town and doesn't contest the prime territory, he's more significant as "the leader of the ABB" than he is as a parahuman threat. The impressive thing that Skitter did wasn't beating him in a fight, it was doing it in such a way that he was there long enough to be arrested.
On the other hand, Worm is big and I can guarantee I've missed some things.

feeling gutted after WS did it again

Update: over the weekend I decided to investigate further, since the more I thought about it, the more I realized that while the text message convo previews I saw gave me a bad feeling, they also didn't give me definitive proof of anything. As a reminder, I had to briefly borrow WS's phone to turn our alarm off last week and on the Messages app main screen I saw one "what you up to" sent on a sat night from an unknown (to me) name, and another alone the lines of "wowwwww" from a name I recognized from the DDay 1 period (a former co-worker).
Well, late night I took a deeper dive and it was eerily similar to DDay 1: emailed hotel reservation info for a work trip to a known former AP (just prior to covid), attempts to coordinate similar meet-ups with other known former APs around the same time (funny thing is they actually seem like they tried to turn WS down lmao), straight up pornographic snaps sent as recently as December 2020, a deleted Snap conversation with a DIFFERENT known former AP (another former co-worker) where all I could see was WS had sent "hi" a few days ago. The "what you up to" text convo was deleted. Snap seemed like it's regularly deleted as there were only two active convo threads, both with the conversations erased except for one word greetings. But I saw numerous x-rated snaps under "saved snaps" or whatever. Can't tell who they were sent to, but it sure as hell wasn't me...
I feel bad bringing you all bad news, and I assure you this wasn't pain shopping. But I had to be 100% certain before making more definitive moves to break away. This locked it for me. There is no ambiguity around what I found. I can't keep rationalizing this, trying to ignore it, or thinking of how I/we can "solve" this problem. I tried. I'm done being the stable one, the "rock," while my WS continues to blatantly lie day in and day out. I regret not getting out immediately post-DDay 1, but my second best option is getting out now. Will keep you posted with more positive developments when I can. In solidarity with anyone else out there reading who finds themselves in a similar position...

Hey all,
Longtime lurker, first time poster here. Burner for obvious reasons and mildly anonymized account, maintaining core details. If you'll indulge me, I'm putting it all down for cathartic purposes.
My DDay was almost 3 years ago. At that time, I had been married for almost 3 years when I found out my wife had been cheating on me routinely. In the months prior to finding out, my spidey sense had been growing increasingly suspicious that *something* was up. Like many of you here, I made the mistake of trusting my partner so readily, so instinctively, as I assumed we were rock solid.
Sure, our marriage had its issues. But they were challenges that we handled together and in many ways bonded us uniquely. We were in our mid-20s when we met in a fast paced east coast city. We were both aspirational, optimistic, and truly loved each other. We just clicked from day 1, the kind of thing you think will never happen until it does. We spent as much time together as possible. It was crazy in the best way.
But after just a couple months, things got a little turbulent. We had a child together, unplanned, and this was at a young-ish age (at least by east coast urban standards). So our relationship from then on was generally defined by stress, but also by having each other's back. We went through a lot together in terms of navigating our families (both lean conservative so the unplanned kid was a challenge in various ways, for example). We had some real trauma bonding. The feeling that, at the end of the day, we come back to each other.
While our trauma bonding was strong, our "normal" relationship bonding wasn't the best. How could we have the time? Both starting our careers while juggling child having/rearing, it was nearly impossible. I started a master's program, in retrospect probably in a fit of anxiety about the other stuff going on in my life. Once that started, I officially had almost no free time. We were just completely stacked.
The thing is, the day-to-day of our newfound stressful life was actually pretty ok for me; I had had a fun college and early-20s post college experience, so I was pretty ready to settle down. I didn't need any more happy hours than I had to go to for professional purposes. I was pretty stoked on the dad lifestyle, truth be told.
But my spouse was in the opposite camp. Her entire life had been heavily regimented due to controlling parents. Minimal social life even through her mid-20s, constantly under their thumb. So once we were married and I realized the dynamic at play, I made it a point to ensure that she could go out on a Saturday night w/ her girlfriends or whatever. Her friends, I'd met and generally liked. So I'd stay in and take care of the baby, maybe write a paper or something. Sometimes I'd even have to cover for her with her parents (who ofc lived around the corner) who might ask me why she wasn't answering her phone; I'd say she was already sleeping. Mind you, I had no FOMO whatsoever as I felt like I'd been there, done that, while for her, she still had that social itch to scratch. So I encouraged her to absolutely go out and have a good time. As a working mother with a stressful job, I *wanted* her to go out and blow off steam.
The cheating essentially took 2 forms: physical cheating (ONS) with complete randos she met at bars (when out on those saturday nights with the girls), and EAs with people she knew, usually coworkers. These were happening simultaneously. From what I know, there were for sure multiple (4+) ONSs, and at least 2+ in the EA/coworker category (sexting, basically). I don't think the latter ever turned into the former, but it is hard to say. Honestly, when you're talking about multiples of 5+, it starts to lose meaning.
I was so so rocked on DDay. It was a thing where I was about to go to bed and saw her phone go off. I'd had the creeping suspicion so I caved and checked. Boy was I in for a surprise at the scale of what i found. Christ.
I was then in the final semester of my master's, working on a research-intensive thesis. Hardest few months of my life getting that done after finding out. We went to MC pretty quickly after and I actually felt her remorse was genuine. She ended up getting diagnosed with some psychological conditions stemming from her tough upbringing, which were framed as the big reason why the cheating happened (among many other behavioral effects). I was willing to analyze the situation very holistically, and it truly did make sense. So I swallowed my pride and decided to work to stay together. For our child above all else.
In the short term, things got better. Sex life improved, I finished school so had more time, and it felt like we could be more open w/ each other. After a few months, we decided on a fresh start across the country to a state we'd both wanted to live for a long time. Away from her parents, away from our past life. Things felt new and hopeful.
First 1+ year went pretty well in the new state. But just before the beginning of the pandemic I had a bad feeling again. She'd been hanging out with some friends of friends who didn't give off the best vibe. Eg, they liked going to strip clubs and were pretty into drugs, albeit in a state where pot is legal. They were into other non-legal stuff too. I'm not judgmental but I just got a bad, untrustworthy vibe from them. I started to notice that she became more guarded again with her phone, just like 2 years before. Spidey senses tingling big time, but I lived in denial for a bit. Didn't want to say it was so even though I knew something was up.
Then one night we were playing an online drinking game (this is like early April mind you, so the Zoom boom heyday) and literally sitting right next to me, I saw her sending hearts and such to someone via text. Some of the unsavory characters mentioned in the last graf were present. It was so out in the open. It turned out to be a rando friend of friend who was on the video call on the other end. She said she sent him hearts because she wanted drugs from him, that's all, nothing to worry about, it wasn't serious, etc etc. Talk about a red flag...
So she said that she'd lay low on the drugs, and she did for a while. But in the past couple months, I noticed a slow uptick again. Starting to talk more with some of that crew again. It seemed to go hand in hand with the phone guarding, but I didn't initially think as much of it as I might've previously for a couple reasons. E.g., she would openly offer to ask if I'd need to use her phone in random circumstances, such as to follow directions in the car; she didn't used to do that. That made me think that maybe I'm overthinking again and she's just texting a random normal friend; she is pretty addicted to the phone in general, so it wouldn't be a shock.
But this came to a head the other night in a weird way. We have an alarm system that is controlled from our phones, and my phone died while it should've been charging overnight (guess it wasn't fully plugged in). I had to go downstairs immediately as the dog had to go out, so I had to use her phone to turn off the alarm. I'll be honest, I braced myself before I opened the phone. I was nervous of what I might see. Well, I caught a glimpse of the Messages screen - not even clicking on an individual conversation, but seeing it among the active apps. And I saw at least 2 convos that were not good.
One was a person whose name I recognized from a few years prior (DDay-era), a known prior sexting partner with whom there is no other known relationship. I could only see their latest message, and it said something to the effect of "wowwww." AKA, something you'd probably send in response to a pic, IMO. Or certainly something suggestive. And I saw a random name - definitely not a known friend - with a "what you up to" message sent the night before, a Saturday where was out with some friends. And this was just in the top 4-5 convos, so who knows what lies beneath...
I couldn't bear to actually click on the app and see what else I might see. I was re-gutted. I've been gutted multiple times now, to the point that it's hard to feel much. But damn, I felt it again, that gut punch feeling. Many of y'all know it like no one else in my life, so here I am sharing it with y'all.
Really struggling with what to do next. I've been in IC previously so thinking I can at the least start that up again and from there, think about my next steps. But damn if I don't feel like this is the beginning of the end of our relationship. I spent the past 2 days trying to act normal while plotting my escape, something I'd never done before. But I think it has to happen. I have to preserve my self (sic).
I apologize for the dire outlook as I do believe rehabilitation and rebuilding are totally possible in the right context. People do make mistakes or make decisions that aren't totally rational. I even experienced a brief rehabilitation and even improvement in my own relationship it in the short term. So if you're someone working toward change post-DDay, I want you to maintain that positive change and happiness *is* possible. I have no doubt about that.
But at the same time, you have to trust your gut. If it feels off in a bad way, then it might be time to jet. It hurts, but it is good to realize that at the end of the day, you can't change other people. They have to change themselves, and if they don't, then at some point your best option is to change yourself. I think I'm nearly there.
Thanks all.

MIL “doesn’t want to spend too much time” with grandchild she begged for

Firstly I would like to say that my MIL is not a crazy bitch from hell. Most of the time she’s a nice lady. But she is sheltered and isn’t emotionally intelligent. MIL doesn’t have any relationships outside the family. She usually says whatever is on her mind without really thinking about the consequences. This usually gets her into a lot of trouble with her daughter, my SIL. They butt heads all the time.
MIL was a stay at home mom for DH and SIL. My FIL has been retired for over 15 years. They have small hobbies and travel (pre-Covid) to keep busy. They also spend a lot of time with my SIL who needs a lot of help, and with SIL’s husband and her stepson, who is a handful I’ve been told.
I gave birth to a beautiful baby girl a few months ago. We really lucked out because she is a super chill baby. She’s our first and the first grandchild in the family (besides the stepson who is six and came to live with SIL around the time I gave birth.)
My MIL has given me some severely mixed signals about being a grandmother. As I understand it, she’s BEGGED my DH for grandchildren before we even met. She would sometimes mention small things about becoming a grandma to us while we were together and she literally screamed with joy when we told her we were expecting. But that’s since changed a lot.
When LO first came home, MIL wanted to come over everyday and snuggle the baby. This was nice because DH and I were able to take showers and naps while she tended to LO. She did that for about a week; which was months ago. She then spent time with SIL and her family and had to quarantine before seeing baby again. After she quarantined she only saw the baby one time then went back to SIL and had to quarantine again. I should mention that during these times my in laws never ask about LO or how we are doing. DH will send them pictures of LO and they will ‘thumbs-up’ them in messenger.
We spent Christmas Day with MIL and FIL and during that time she seemed really happy and said “whenever you go back to work, let me know so I can come help out!” I thought: great! I work remotely and have a flexible schedule and a understanding team, so I was planning on keeping LO home with me as long as possible until most of society has been vaccinated.
They had to quarantine again after seeing SIL early January and finally came over to see LO. At the end of the night, I told MIL “hey I’m going back to work part time soon, how much time would you be willing to donate to the cause?” I expected a really enthusiastic answer after spending a lovely day with LO, but she got really quiet and sat down. (This is super out of character for her.) Then she hit me with this: “I know your mom takes care of your sisters kids a lot, but I’m not willing to sign myself up as childcare.” Let me tell you, that hit me like a ton of bricks. I told her I was hoping she could pop in for maybe an hour or two here or there once or twice a week, since she had previously offered. And she responded with: “well I don’t want to see her too much, because when I do see her I really want to enjoy her.” I think I felt my heart crack in my chest. FIL stepped in and said “I think we can swing that.” And eventually she said “yeah I guess we can come by, let us know.” But now I am way to uncomfortable to ever ask them for help ever again
I found her words to be incredibly hurtful, my parents live across the country and have not been able to meet LO because they are both considered high risk for Covid. My mom cries when we video chat and she sees the baby. My parents have already missed so much and my in-laws show such little interest, it’s really a shame.
I’m still planning on keeping LO home with me while I work. I have friends who do it now, and I know we will manage. That doesn’t hurt me as much as this woman not wanting to spend “too much time” with her first grandchild.
DH thinks that my SIL has had some influence on her. We went no contact with SIL last year because she has a lot of mental health issues. I wouldn’t put it past her but, why? Another thing to point out is SIL isn’t planning on having children of her own (she’s been saying this since I met her several years ago) and MIL is constantly trying to convince her to have kids. They fight about it all the time and MIL mentions it every time we see her.
One last thing is: DH and I have a trip planned later in the year and MIL keeps saying how she can’t wait to take LO while we are away. But I’m really not comfortable leaving my baby with someone who sees her maybe twice a month for a few hours and knows nothing about her temperament or her schedule. When MIL brings it up again, I’m going to tell her I’m thinking about flying my parents down to watch LO instead. I’m sure that’s going to cause another rift.
All-in-all, I’m having a really hard time getting past this. I think about it a lot even though I don’t want to. It sucks so much that my in-laws are the only support we have locally. Now I don’t even know how to look at this woman anymore.
Am I overreacting? What should I do? Part of me thinks it has something to do with me, but why take that out on a child? LO is pretty much the perfect baby, and we don’t really need any help, thank god, but even just showing some interest would be nice.
Thank you for reading.
TL;DR MIL says she doesn’t want to spend too much time with new grandchild so she can “enjoy her” when she sees her, after begging DH for years for grandchildren.
Edit: this got a lot more attention than I was expecting and I want to thank you all for reading and taking the time to comment if you do! I just want to double down on the fact that I don’t really need MIL for childcare. That’s fine, but what really bothers me is her general lack of interest in LO (unless we are talking about DH and I leaving LO with MIL and FIL for a whole week.) I’m also planning on talking to my therapist about it so I can sort out my feelings. Please feel free to read all my responses below.
Edit #2: for everyone who wants to tell me I suck because I expected my MIL to be a babysitter, I get it. I’ll fuck off now. Thanks.
Update: Since someone asked, I’m providing an update. MIL actually brought it up on her own today. She said “we really need to talk about [LO.] I can’t commit to anything because [SIL] and her husband are constantly fighting about money and the stepson. They are on the cusp of a divorce. We want to offer her to come stay with us for two weeks alone to see if that helps.” FIL also sad that “they need to be able to see SIL. Because SIL keeps getting depressed about not being able to see her parents for six months.” (not sure where the six months came from.) DH told them he understands but it was a shock to have them do a 180 on us. He reiterated that we don’t necessarily need her help but we wanted her to have a close relationship with her grandchild, like she expressed. He also told her her words were confusing and hurtful. That didn't get much of a reaction. It still hasn’t gotten to the root of why they seem so uninterested. But I’ve decided to drop it. I think it’s a combo of being consumed by SIL’s situation and just being overall socially awkward and reserved people. 🤷🏻‍♀️

Have You Heard of the Tell-Tale Heart Game?

“What’s all that?” my friend Aaron asked as he followed me down the steps into the basement. He was referring to the tattered rows of cardboard boxes stacked in the corner.
“That’s my grandfather’s junk,” I said, making my way to the couch. “My dad had to clean out his house when he died and didn’t have time to go through it so he shoved it down here.”
“Sorry, dude,” Aaron said, offering his condolences. That was the first time he had heard about my grandfather passing away.
“Don’t be,” I said, grabbing the remote and turning on the TV, “I’ve never met him.”
“Seriously?” he asked, taking a seat on the opposite side of the couch.
“Seriously,” I replied, handing him one of the video game controllers, “My dad never talked about him. I didn’t even know he was alive until my mom told me he had died last week.”
“Did you go to the funeral?”
“There wasn’t one,” I snapped. I was starting to get annoyed with Aaron. The reason I had invited him over was to play video games, not talk about my dead grandfather. “You ready?” I asked, lifting my controller.
“Let’s do this,” he replied, thankfully dropping all talk of my grandfather.
We spent the next three hours blasting our way through a dystopian landscape, killing hordes of demons and other hellspawn.
“I need to take a break,” Aaron said, setting his controller down after being beheaded by a demon prince’s sword, “My thumbs are starting to cramp up.”
He got up off of the couch to stretch his legs while I continued playing the game, trying to make it to the next save point. I lost sight of him as he walked behind the couch and didn’t know what he was doing until I heard a loud commotion behind me. I quickly paused the game and turned around to see what had happened.
“Sorry,” Aaron apologized, standing in the middle of a bunch of my grandfather’s things. The stuff had tumbled out of their boxes when he caused one of the stacks to fall over. “I’ll clean it up.”
“What the hell, man?” I exploded, dropping my controller onto the couch as I got up to see if he had broken anything.
“It was an accident,” he blurted out, “I just wanted to see what was in the boxes, but I accidentally bumped one with my knee, and then the whole stack fell over.”
I knelt down next to one of the boxes, righted it, and then began putting stuff back inside of it. “Come on,” I said, “We need to hurry and clean this up before my parents see it.”
We were nearly done when Aaron stopped and held something out to me, “Check this out,” he said. In his hands was a tattered boardgame box whose corners were held together by masking tape.
Large red letters, made to look like blood smears, spelled out the name of the game: The Tell-Tale Heart. Beneath that was a cartoonish drawing of a man holding out a heart cradled in the palms of his hands. Underneath the drawing was the tag line: You Lie You Die!
“That’s Poe, right?” Aaron asked, pointing at the drawing of the man.
“Yeah,” I confirmed, reaching out and taking the box from him.
“I remember having to read that story for my American Lit class last year,” Aaron declared.
I set the box on the floor and gently pulled the lid off, careful not to damage it any further. Inside it was a large plastic replica of a human heart that was scratched and faded along with a bunch of blank cards that had yellowed with age. When I didn’t see the instructions, I assumed they were lost until I saw that they were printed on the inside of the box lid.
“We should play it,” Aaron suggested as I placed the lid back on the box.
“Why?” I scoffed.
“Something different to do.”
“It looks dumb.” I wasn’t a big fan of board games.
“I have something that might make it a little more interesting.” Aaron reached into the pocket of his jeans and pulled out a small baggie full of weed.
“Where did you get this?” I asked, standing up and taking the bag from him. There was enough weed in it for at least three, maybe four, joints.
“Does it matter?” was his reply as he snatched the bag away from me.
“We can’t smoke it here,” I said. “My parents will be home any minute.”
“We can smoke it at Brett’s house,” Aaron suggested.
“I thought he was still on vacation.”
“He’s back,” Aaron pulled out his phone, and began composing a text to Brett, “I saw them unloading their car on my way home last night.”
“Why the hell isn’t he here then?” Brett was usually the first one at my house every day. It wasn’t like him to skip out on gaming with Aaron and me.
Aaron shrugged. His phone chimed a moment later. He looked down at it before holding it out for me to see, “He says we can come over.”
“Let’s go,” I said, starting to walk towards the stairs.
“Don’t forget the game,” Aaron pointed.
“Seriously?” I had hoped he wasn’t serious about playing it.
“Come on,” he prodded, “It’ll be fun.”
“I doubt that,” I said, turning around to scoop up the game.
Fifteen minutes later we were standing on the porch of Brett’s house waiting for him to answer the door.
“Why the hell didn’t you tell us you were back?” I badgered Brett as he let us inside.
“I would have,” he said, shutting the door behind us, “But I’m grounded.”
“What did you do this time?” Aaron asked. Brett was frequently in trouble with his parents.
“I don’t want to talk about it,” he said, walking past us on his way to the basement.
“Did your parents say you could have anyone over?” I asked, already knowing the answer.
“No,” Brett replied, “But they won’t be home for hours, so it doesn’t matter.” We followed him down the basement steps as he spoke.
Unlike my house, Brett’s basement wasn’t finished. It was just a concrete storage room beneath the house. His parents rarely went down there which made it the perfect place to light up.
“Open up the windows,” Brett said to Aaron, pointing at the small rectangular panes of glass high on the wall.
While Aaron did that, Brett and I grabbed the folding chairs from behind the stairs and set them up.
Once everything was situated, we took our seats around the large plastic crate we were using as a makeshift table.
“What’s that?” Brett asked, pointing at the Tell-Tale Heart game, clutched beneath my arm.
“Some stupid board game we found in my basement,” I answered, handing the game to Brett so he could take a look at it. “Aaron wants us to play it.”
“Looks dumb,” Brett said, tossing the game onto the crate after reading the description on the back of the box.
“See,” I said, gesturing at Brett while looking at Aaron, “He doesn’t want to play it either.”
While Brett was looking at the game, Aaron had pulled out the weed and began rolling a joint.
“If you don’t play,” Aaron lit the joint and took a long drag off of it. He held the smoke in his lungs for a few seconds before exhaling, “You don’t smoke.”
“That’s bullshit,” I complained.
“My weed, my rules,” he smiled, taking another hit off the joint.
I looked over at Brett, waiting to see if he was going to protest as well.
He shrugged his shoulders, “Whatever,” he sighed, “I just want to get high.”
“Let’s do this,” Aaron said, handing me the joint before grabbing the game box and dumping the contents out on the crate.
While Aaron read over the rules and set up the game, Brett and I passed the joint back and forth a couple of times.
“Alright,” Aaron declared, “I think it’s all set up and ready to go.” He held out his hand, wanting me to pass him the joint, “Who wants to go first?”
The three of us looked at each other.
“It’s Cory’s game,” Brett spoke up, “I think he should go first.”
“It was Aaron’s idea,” I countered, “He should go first.”
“I agree with Brett,” Aaron said, “Two against one. That means you’re going first, Cory” He reached out and turned the plastic heart so that the sculpted aorta was facing me.
“Fine,” I huffed, looking down at the poorly sculpted fake heart, wanting to get the ordeal over with, “What am I supposed to do?”
“Press the button on top,” he pointed at the heart, “Then answer the question on the card that pops out.”
“What button?” I didn’t see anything that looked like a button.
“Are you blind?” Aaron leaned forward and placed his finger on a small circle of plastic that was set into the muscle of the heart. “It’s right here.”
I ignored his insult and pressed my index finger down on the button. There was a click and then a small white card was pushed out of a thin slit between the large blood vessels on top of the heart.
“It’s blank,” I said, looking down at the card sticking out of the slot. “Are you sure you weren’t supposed to write questions on the cards before you put them in the heart?” I asked. I was pretty sure all of the cards were blank when I looked through the components at my house.
Aaron picked up the box lid and reread the instructions printed on the inside, “It doesn’t say to do that.” He tossed the lid aside.
“Check the other side,” Brett suggested.
I pulled the card out of the slot and flipped it over, expecting it to be blank, but it wasn’t. Written in an old-fashioned news font was the following question: HAVE YOU EVER STOLEN SOMETHING FROM A FRIEND?
“What does it say?” Aaron asked.
I read the question out loud.
“Well?” Brett asked, “Have you?”
I set the card on the table. Under normal circumstances, I would have said, “No,” and left it at that, but these weren’t normal conditions. The pot had loosened my inhibitions and I was feeling really annoyed at having to play the game. Before I could stop myself, I blurted out, “Yes, I have stolen something from a friend.”
“What did you steal?” Aaron was quick to ask.
“What does it matter?” I said, trying to distance myself from my admission, “I answered the question. My turn is done.”
“Actually, your turn isn’t over,” Aaron said, picking the box lid back up and pointing to it, “According to the rules, if you answer yes to the question on the card, Brett and I each get to ask you a follow-up question.”
I snatched the box lid out of his hands and read over the rules, “That’s stupid.”
“So, I ask again, what did you steal?” Aaron leaned forward, looking at me expectantly.
“It says here you can only ask me a yes or no question,” I flung the box lid, trying to hit him with it but he ducked out of the way.
“Did you steal something from me?” Brett asked, reaching out to Aaron, wanting him to hand over the joint.
“No.” I turned to face him. Stealing from him would have been suicide. He was much bigger than I and had a quick temper. “I’m not stupid enough to steal something from you.”
“Yeah,” Brett smirked, taking a hit from the joint before holding it out to me, “I would have kicked your ass if I caught you.”
“You’re the one who stole my Pokemon cards,” Aaron declared, pointing his finger at my chest.
“It was ten years ago.” I took a long drag off the joint and offered it to him.
“I fucking knew it!”
“I’ll buy you some more next time I go to the store,” I joked. None of us had played the silly little card game in years.
“What did you do with them?” Aaron asked, stubbing out the remains of the joint.
“I traded them for better cards,” I said.
“You’re an asshole,” he said as he started rolling a new joint, but he was smiling when he said it, letting me know that he wasn’t going to hold a grudge about it. At least he wasn’t going to as long as we were all high. His attitude might change later.
“Who’s next?” I asked, wanting to divert attention to someone else.
“I’ll go,” Aaron said, lighting up the new joint. He pressed the button on top of the plastic heart and grabbed the card as soon as it was ejected. The smile dropped from his face as he read the card.
“What does it say?” Brett asked.
Aaron set the card face down on the plastic crate, “You guys are right,” he said, “This game is stupid. Let’s do something else.”
“Ah, hell no,” I said, snatching the card off of the crate, “I answered my question. Now you have to answer yours.” I held the card up and read it out loud. “Are you gay?”
That was an oddly specific question, considering there have been rumors going around the school that Aaron slept with one of the guys on the swim team. I could see how that question would make him feel uncomfortable and why he didn’t want to play the game any longer. I felt uncomfortable after asking it.
Seeing the look on Aaron’s face made me start thinking about the question that was on my card. When I first read it, I didn’t think anything of it. Now, after reading Aaron’s question, I was starting to believe that these questions were being given deliberately. It was as if the game somehow knew the secrets we were keeping from each other.
“It doesn’t matter if you are,” Brett said, taking the joint out of Aaron’s hand, “As long as you keep supplying these,” he brought the joint to his lips, “I don’t care whose dick you had to suck to get it.”
I gave Brett a look, “Dude,” I said, shaking my head to let him know his comment wasn’t appreciated and that he shouldn’t say anything else.
“I wanted to tell you guys,” Aaron blurted out, “I just didn’t think you’d want to be friends with me if you knew.”
“You don’t want to fuck me, do you?” Brett asked, putting the joint to his lips.
“BRETT!” I scolded him, throwing up my hands at his insensitivity.
“What?” he shrugged, “He confirmed he was gay. According to the rules we each get to ask him a yes or no question. That was my question.” He took another hit of the joint before passing it to me.
“You don’t have to answer that,” I said to Aaron.
“It’s fine,” Aaron replied to me before turning to Brett, “No, I don’t want to fuck you,” he sneered, “You’re not my type.”
“I’m not sure he’s anyone’s type,” I said, taking a shot at Brett, trying to lighten the mood.
Brett responded by flipping me off and taking the joint from my hand.
“Is there something you want to ask?” Aaron said to me.
I wasn’t planning on asking a question, but since he brought it up, I did, “Is it true?” I asked, “The rumor?”
Aaron nodded his head, “We’ve secretly been seeing each other for about a year now.”
“That explains why you haven’t been around much lately,” I said, giving him a little light-hearted ribbing.
“So,” Brett said, exhaling a large plume of smoke as he handed the joint to Aaron, “Are you a top or a bottom?”
Aaron and I exchanged an annoyed look.
“You already asked your question.” I placed my hand on top of the plastic heart and turned it towards Brett, “Now it’s your turn to answer.”
Brett looked down at the heart, leaned back in his chair, and crossed his arms over his chest, “Pass,” he said.
“You don’t get to pass,” I pointed my finger at him, “Not after Aaron and I have already taken turns.
Before Brett could respond, the heart made a clicking sound and a card was ejected. All three of us stared at the card.
“If you’re not going to read it,” I leaned forward and acted like I was going to take the card, but Brett snatched it out of the heart before I could.
He held the card before his face for a moment before tearing it up and tossing the pieces onto the ground.
“What did it say?” I asked
“It doesn’t matter.” He took a long drag from the joint, burning it down until there was almost nothing left, and then dropped it on the floor, extinguishing it beneath the heel of his sneaker. “The answer was no.”
It was clear from his demeanor that he didn’t like what he had read on the card and that he didn’t want us to know what it had said.
“That’s bullshit,” I snapped at him, “Aaron and I read our questions out loud. It’s only fair that you tell us what yours was.”
The heart clicked again and ejected another card.
Brett and I looked down at the card before looking across the crate at each other. Both of us must have had the same thought because we lunged for the card at the same time.
I was a fraction of a second faster than Brett and was able to snatch the card out of the heart before he did. With the card in my hand, I quickly turned and walked a few steps away from Brett, reading the card out loud as he moved to stop me.
“Have you ever killed someone?” I turned back around as Brett caught up to me and yanked the card out of my hand, pushing me to the floor with his other hand.
I thought Brett was ashamed of what his question would reveal, the way Aaron and I were, but the implications of what was on that card were far worse and it horrified me.
Brett tore up the second card, “I haven’t killed anyone,” he declared, tossing the pieces at me.
I looked over at Aaron and saw the same worried looked on his face that was on mine, what the fuck? I mouthed the words. Aaron shrugged and then we both looked back at Brett.
Brett was clearly agitated, pacing back and forth like a caged animal.
“Stop looking at me like that,” he snapped, seeing the concerned looks Aaron and I were giving him, “And shut that thing up,” he pointed at the plastic heart sitting on the crate.
I got up off of the floor and approached the plastic crate, trying to hear whatever it was that Brett was hearing, “I don’t hear anything,” I said, casting my eyes over to Aaron who shook his head, confirming that he didn’t hear anything either.
“How can you not hear that?” Brett ranted, “It’s so fucking loud.”
“What does it sound like?” I asked.
“What do you mean what does it sound like?” he scoffed, “It sounds like a heartbeat.”
Aaron and I just stared at him.
“You seriously can’t hear that?” Brett questioned, once again pointing at the heart, cocking his head to the side as he listened to something only he could hear, “Thump-thump, thump-thump, thump-thump,” he mimicked the phantom sound.
I made a show of trying to listen, before picking up the heart and holding it close to my ear, “Sorry,” I said, “I still don’t hear anything.”
“It can’t make any noise,” Aaron said, taking the heart from me and prying it apart to show Brett the hollowed-out interior. There was no batter battery compartment, or speaker, or electronics of any kind inside of it. All we could see were the cards and the spring-loaded mechanism that was used to eject the cards.
Aaron put the heart back together and set it on the table.
“Stop fucking with me,” he growled, pointing his finger from me to Aaron.
“We’re not,” Aaron and I replied in almost perfect unison.
“Liars!” he screamed, sending spittle flying from his mouth.
“I think we should go,” I said to Aaron, nodding towards the stairs.
Aaron pushed himself up from his chair. He was as eager to leave as I was.
“You’re not going anywhere,” Brett threatened, placing himself between us and the stairs, “Not until you turn that thing off,” he looked past us to where the heart sat on the table.
Aaron grabbed the heart and thrust it into Brett’s hands, “You turn it off,” he said.
“Fine,” he said, letting the heart fall to the floor, “I will.” He lifted his foot and brought it down as hard as he could. The plastic heart shattered into hundred pieces as it was crushed under the weight of his foot.
At the same instance the heart busted apart, Brett cried out and grabbed his chest, doubling over as if he were in excruciating pain.
“What the fuck’s wrong with him?” Aaron asked, having to step back to avoid being hit as Brett fell to the floor.
“I don’t know,” I said, “But I think we should go.”
“He looks like he’s dying,” Aaron said, skirting around Brett as he writhed on the floor, “Shouldn’t we call 911 or something?”
“I suppose,” I replied, despite every instinct telling me to get the fuck out of the house.
Aaron pulled out his phone and made the call.
Ten minutes later, a police officer pulled us outside to take our statement while the paramedics worked to revive Brett.
“He just fell over?” the officer asked. It was the first question he had asked while we were explaining what had happened.
“Yeah,” Aaron and I agreed.
“Did he have any health issues that you were aware of?”
We both shook our heads.
“How much pot did you smoke?” I could feel the officer’s eyes boring into me.
“Two joints,” Aaron said.
“Do you have any pot on you right now?”
Aaron reached into his pocket and pulled out the baggie containing the remaining pot and handed it to the officer.
“I think I’ve gotten everything I need from you for now,” the officer said, closing his notebook and putting it back in his pocket. “If I need anything else, I’ll be in touch. You can go home now.”
Aaron and I got up and left, walking the two blocks back to my house. The entire time we walked Aaron, was intently staring at his phone.
“Check this out,” he said, holding out his phone so I could see the screen as we walked up my driveway towards the house.
On his phone was a news article with a headline that read: SEARCH CONTINUES FOR MISSING LOCAL GIRL.
“Why are you showing me this?” I asked.
“I think Brett killed her,” he said, explaining his reasoning before I could say anything else, “That town,” he pointed at the name mentioned in the article, “That’s where Brett went while he was on vacation.” He scrolled down to the part of the article where it talked about the day the girl disappeared, “She was reported missing the day before Brett came home.”
“That doesn’t mean he killed her.” Even though I said it, I didn’t really believe it.
“Why else would the game ask him if he killed someone?” Aaron countered, saying what I was already thinking, “It knew you stole my pokemon cards,” he gestured at me, “It knew I was gay,” he gestured at himself. “The game knew he killed her. I’m sure of it. And it killed him because he refused to tell the truth.”
“You lie, you die,” I said, recalling the game’s catchphrase that was printed in bold letters on the front of the box.

How to get hired in Hell

PART 2 PART 3 PART 4
Like any other person approaching thirty, I’d had my share of disillusionment about my career. Well, if you could call it a “career” – I’d been stuck in the same low-level marketing job for years and the closer I got to my thirtieth birthday, the more I felt like it was time for a change. But I never would have thought my next employer would be Hell.
The past three years of my life have been monotonous. Alarm rings at quarter past eight, sometimes it’s still dark out, sometimes not, depends on the season. I shower, stare at the grout between the tiles until I wake up, make my toast before my housemate comes downstairs and takes over the kitchen. I put three coats of mascara on, pick a jacket according to the forecast for the day, and walk half a kilometer to work in the foggy dawn.
Every morning went exactly like that, so much so that my state of autopilot seemed impenetrable. I doubt I would have noticed if aliens landed, I was so busy not-focusing with my hands stuffed into my coat pockets, looking forward to my second cup of tea which I always had at quarter past nine. But then, in late October a few days before my thirtieth birthday, something unusual happened that rocked my state of self-induced fugue.
It was 4:15 on a Friday, I was sitting at my desk as Rob, one of the accountants, passed me on his way to the canteen.
“Heya, Sarah,” he said cordially, clutching his empty mug and stack of photocopies almost defensively. “Any plans for the weekend?”
“Not really, no. There’s some gig on my boyfriend wants to go to but that’s it,” I said while still staring at my computer screen. I considered briefly whether I should add that it was my birthday on Monday but decided that it seemed outside the question and I didn’t want to come off self-absorbed.
“Did you get that email from Gerry about the training next week? Were we supposed to get the materials for that today?” Rob said.
“Oh, Jesus, yeah,” I said, bringing my hands up to my face, “I was supposed to get the fecking training pack from their office across the way.”
I rushed to get out of my seat, “No worries, I was just wondering,” Rob said. He was clearly flustered that he’d caused me such a fuss.
“No really, thanks for reminding me.”
I left my jacket on the back of my chair and headed for the door. As the events manager, I was supposed to distribute materials for training to the rest of my co-workers which essentially made me a glorified delivery boy. Thankfully, the office that distributed the materials was just across the shopping centre and still open.
I collected the twenty plain, manilla envelopes and rushed back to our office across the car park with the papers spilling out of my arms, hurrying to get them distributed before everyone started peeling off early for the weekend. In my fervor, something caught my eye. It was a man, slowing down as he walked under the overpass. There was something hunched and motionless at his feet. On first glance, I thought it was a cat, but looking closer, I saw it was a pigeon. It looked like it was struggling – the wind mercilessly ruffling its pearlescent feathers as it teetered back and forth on its semi-outstretched wings. The man eventually left and continued walking down the street, leaving the injured pigeon in his shadow.
Fifteen minutes later I was back in the car park walking towards the pigeon with a bulk bag of cheese crackers from the euro store. Please don’t be dead, please don’t be dead I thought as I approached the bird. It looked dead. Its head was bobbed over, dirty beak scraping against the pavement. The feathers of its wings were roughed up, bent at odd angles from trying to scrabble across the car park.
I crumbled up one of the diamond-shaped crackers between my fingers and placed it in front of the fallen bird. No interest. Its eyelids lazily opened and closed like the doors of an empty elevator shaft. Mechanical and lifeless.
Yet the poor creature was still clinging to life. Every time it became still and I thought maybe it was dead, it jerked around its wings and tried to lift its head up off the pavement. I could feel tears welled in my eyes although I was willing myself not to cry, not in the car park outside the office. People occasionally slowed down to see what I was doing, although most of them just shot a pitiful look at the girl who was trying to save a bird that death had seemingly already claimed.
I would’ve taken the pigeon home to die somewhere warm if only I’d had a box or something to carry it in. I didn’t want it to die alone here. Nothing deserved to die alone and frightened, not even a bird. I secretly longed that it would just die to minimize its struggling, or that someone would be able to come along and rescue it.
Then came the death rattle. I never thought a bird could breathe so heavily, but out came a raspy, belabored breath that shook the whole thing’s body in a rhythmic convulsion. It reminded me of watching my Nan die in the hospital.
Suddenly, someone came up behind me. I could hear their footsteps slowing.
“It’s you!” A female voice cried.
I pivoted around. Above me stood an aging woman with tight brown curls pinned haphazardly around her head, streaked with wiry grey hairs. She was wearing a reflective purple puffer jacket, her age-spotted hands sticking defiantly out of the sleeves. She looked at me with a dumbfounded smile, some of her teeth grey and decayed.
“What?” I said.
“It’s you!” She pointed gleefully at me, “I knew it was you. You’ll be perfect for the job. You already have your first soul.”
She hobbled around front and gingerly scooped up the wilted bird with her firm hands, tucking it under her arm carefully.
“What – what are you on about? What are you doing?” I said and raised to my feet.
She smiled a tremulous smile. “Come with me, girl. What’s your name? When were ye born?”
She teetered towards the road and I followed her, not wanting her to whisk the pigeon away without figuring out what she intended to do with it.
“Uh, Sarah. I’m Sarah. I was born on the 31st of October.” I paused before giving her the year.
“Perfect, just perfect. I knew it!” She raised one hand in the air, the one that wasn’t tucked underneath the bird.
Suddenly, she spun back around and shook her finger under my chin. “We have a job for you. A job offer. Wonderful job, lots of money,” she waved ecstatically, “but I can’t take you now, on account of it being light out.”
“Wha-? Who’s we?” I said.
She shushed me.
“Never mind that. What you need to do is meet me down by the quays in two hours. You’ll know the place - beneath the blinking streetlamp. I’ll take you to the job.”
I stared at her, dumbfounded. She looked back and forth across the road, attempting to cross it, then looked back at me and said, “In the meantime, I will take care of this one, he’s not gone to the other side yet. I’ll make him a nice nest in a box next to my radiator.” She stroked the pigeon’s head gently with her thumb, and then she tumbled off across the road and evaporated.
I stared at the empty space where she had been. Every nerve in my skin was tingling.
When I got home, my boyfriend Derek was in the kitchen stirring a mug of tea.
“How was work?” he asked quietly. His dark hair hung limply in his eyes. He was wearing a cream and blue jumper with a distorted argyle pattern that seemed, to me, overly festive for a bleak October day.
“Oh god, don’t get me started,” I moaned, peeling my trainers off of my feet and reaching to hang up my jacket, “I had the weirdest experience as I was leaving today, it was bizarre.”
He motioned for me to join him at the kitchen table. I sat down in the wooden chair across from him.
“I think I got offered a job,” I said.
“Well, that’s wonderful!” he said, “What kind of job?”
“Well – that’s the thing, you see. I don’t know. And it was a lady who seemed kind of, uh, insane. So, I honestly don’t know.”
Derek’s congratulatory expression melted into a quizzical one. “So, was this in work, like? Or, on LinkedIn or something?”
“No, it was in the car park.”
He raised his eyebrows speculatively.
“I stopped to rescue this pigeon who was hurt. Maybe it had been hit by a car or something. Anyway, this older woman came up to me all excited like she recognized me or she knew me or – you know. And then she went on about how I was going to be perfect for this job ‘we’ have and to meet her down by the river in two hours.”
“Well, are you going to go meet her, so?” Derek asked.
I stared at him, “I mean no? She was a header I’m pretty sure.”
He sipped his tea, “You never know. It could be a real job. I mean you’re always on about how much you hate your job now.”
“What if she sells me into human trafficking?” I exclaimed, “Or – or murders me?”
“Do you really think she could murder you? I thought you said she was an old woman.”
“Well, yes, but what if she’s the bait? Don’t human traffickers always use women as bait so you, like, trust them more?”
Derek snorted, “I’m not really familiar with the whole human trafficking protocol. I think you should go, though. I can come with you to make sure she doesn’t murder you.” He winked.
“You’re hardly serious,” I laughed, rolling my eyes, “Speaking of jobs, how are we for making the rent this month?”
His eyes lost the playful glint for a moment, “Should be grand. I’m covering for David Saturday, so I’ll have two double shifts this weekend now.”
“Right,” I said. I felt a hint of shame gnawing at my stomach. In a way, I felt guilty for Derek and our reliance on his toilsome work as a runner, the hours he spent absorbed in the chaotic ambience of the bar, subjected to the more experienced bartenders’ chronic stress and mismanagement and the late-night brawls of college students. At the same time, I felt a kind of envy in the sense that his long, back-breaking hours never dampened his spirit in the way that my paper-pushing job felt like it was breaking mine.
Derek and I had met in college through a mutual friend we’d since lost touch with. He was an eclectic music major who played in a trad band on weekends and I was a mercurial journalism student who spent too many hours in the library and then too many hours drinking on weekends. I had always admired him for his dedication to music and his belief that one day he’d make it his career. As the years rolled on and I was forced to give up my interests in order to make enough money to survive, that admiration had slowly festered and grown into resentment.
I could feel my spine arched against the wooden chair and realized it hurt.
“Alright, I’ll go meet her,” I conceded, “Who knows, could be a job I’m actually good at.”
The rain had already started by the time we left the flat. Puddles gleamed with neon reflections along the street. The city lights made the sleeting rain shine green, red, and yellow.
I pulled my scarf tightly around my ears so I could see nothing but what was directly in front of me. I pivoted on the top of the steps to make sure Derek was following behind me.
“She said to meet her underneath the blinking streetlamp,” I said plainly. He gave a stumped shrug as he closed the gate to the courtyard behind him.
I made my way down the slick steps. Ivy glistened, wet and trailing over the cement walls of our neighbors’ gardens. Abandoned crisp packets and shards of naggins melted into the footpath at every turn, reflecting light into my eyes. There seemed something so forbidden about the city in the rain.
We only lived about ten minutes up the street from the river. A series of arterial bridges connected the Northside to City Centre; streetlamps and moldy, faded life buoys dotted the quays in between. For the life of me I had no idea which quay the woman had wanted me to meet her at, nor did I know of any flickering streetlamps this side of the city.
“I guess maybe we should just walk along the quays until we see a blinking light?” Derek suggested.
My hands rose up to my face, hovering around my damp polyester scarf, “This is so mental,” I said, “I can’t believe we’re walking around in the pissing rain to meet a crazy woman.”
We walked westbound for about ten minutes without talking. I could hear the river rushing with all the accumulated rainfall – I was starting to fear it’d burst its banks. I was hyperaware of all the lights around me – reflections of neon signs in puddles, the flood of light from doors opening and closing, car headlights misdirected in the mist. There were no flickering streetlamps.
“Think we should call it a night?” I asked Derek, “Walk around in the rain some other time, maybe.”
He pointed ahead of him, “Is that it?”
I looked up. I saw the ground reflecting soft yellow light ahead of us, a shorting-out streetlight hunched over it.
“No way,” I said, “No way, no way, no way.”
I scanned the area for any sign of the woman. There was nothing around, just the white-capped, tumultuous river to our left and a derelict web of rain-soaked alleys and an old Japanese café with a blue dragon painted on the shuttered storefront. No sign of life besides the buzzing of the dying streetlamp.
“Sarah!” I heard a distorted hiss coming from the river. It was her, sporadically lit by the lamp, her rain jacket reflecting beams back out into the night. She wasn’t underneath the streetlight or even in the street, but beyond the iron guardrails on the top of the concrete steps that led down to the thunderous river.
I spun around to Derek to judge his expression. His eyes were as wide as mine.
“I’m just going go over and see what she wants and then we will leave,” I tried to keep my voice steady.
“I will be right here,” Derek said, “Right behind you. She won’t be able to do anything to you.” He grabbed my shoulders - it was only under his grip that I realized I was shaking.
I approached the guardrails and looked over at the woman perched on the steps.
“What do you want?” I said aggressively. Her hood was pulled down over her face. Spume from the raging water lapped up onto her wellies, reaching up from the dark, churning abyss below.
“Sarah, I knew you’d come,” she said, “But there’s not much time, I must take you to the job, come!” She reached over the guardrail to grab me with her slippery hand. It was then when I noticed a wooden rowboat, tall at either side like a gondola, tethered to the base of the steps. It bobbed, frenzied, on the unrelenting waves.
“No!” I screamed, “You’ll drown me! You’re going to kill me! Derek!”
“He can’t hear you,” she said, “Now, go on.”
She pulled me harder so that my ribs were pressed against the cold metal of the guardrail. I was crying now, like a petulant child having a fit, but my crying made me less resistant as the woman placed my hands on the rail and urged me to climb it. Weakened and somehow willed to follow her, I scaled the guardrail. Its paint was rubbing off and black flecks became embedded in my hands. I could feel the spray of sloshing water in my face as I looked down at the black riptides. I tried to look up and find Derek for help, but I couldn’t make out anything through the soft, illuminated cloud of mist.
The woman had already descended the steps and was waist-deep in water. She seized the gondola with both hands and steadied it so I could crawl in. Seeing my hysteria, she gripped my arm with a cold, slick hand and guided me in. I did not have the strength to resist; I was a weak and lifeless buoy embraced in the never-ending water.
Wherever she was taking me, I didn’t know. I could not register much of our voyage to the other side, mainly because it was eerily calm even with the tumultuous weather that night. I kept my eyes closed firmly, seeing nothing except the multi-colored lights that bled through, buzzing like electric sparks from severed wires.
When I finally opened my eyes, I could hardly see anything. Green and purple blobs dotted my vision. As the real world started to give way, I could see that we were eastbound. I could see the back of the Port of Cork sign, its white support beams looking like the threads of a spider web in the soft light. The water was calm now, gentle and rippled like indigo silk. It looked like dawn even though it surely couldn’t be later than eight o’clock.
The woman faced away from me, hunched over and churning the oars on either side of the boat like a Viking. She seemed unphased, which somehow comforted me. I could see people streaming along the bridges, headphones on, staring at the ground.
“Why is no one looking at us?” I asked in a quiet, resigned voice.
“I told you,” she said melodically, “They can’t see us.”
She curved her oar gracefully like the fin of a fish and steered us over to where a barnacle-covered ladder ejected out of the river and onto a tall brown wall. Her fat hands reached out to slip a thick, frayed rope around the corroded metal.
“Climb,” she instructed me, dully.
“You’re joking?”
She looked at me sternly, “Now you think I’m joking?”
Already defeated, I grabbed onto the gritty, rotting ladder and hoisted myself up. I tried not to look down as I scaled it.
Above me was an old orange shipping container, bigger than a small house. The woman climbed up after me and banged on the door, which echoed back in a thunderous rattle.
I felt her hand on my back, pushing me towards the entrance, “That was just for courtesy’s sake,” she said sweetly, “We can go in.”
The container was dim and empty inside, shades of grey coloring the whole expanse. Three fluorescent bulbs hung from the ceiling, illuminating a long, cluttered desk standing squarely in the middle. A short man was hunched over it, filling out paperwork.
“Ah, Mary,” he said, not looking up from his incessant scribbling, “You’re here. Who have you brought me.”
“It’s her!” Mary said enthusiastically, “She’s our one!”
The man squinted up at me. He had beady eyes that shone behind thick, black-rimmed glasses. He was bald, with a flat, wide nose and thick lips concealing the remnants of nubby teeth. He was wearing a blue two-piece suit that shone in the light with a houndstooth dress shirt peeking out underneath. He sniffed.
“And…?” he said.
“And, well, her name’s Sarah!” Mary added, hesitating.
The man’s thick brows knit together. My hair dripped water onto the floor. The shipping container was drafty, making my damp clothes cling to my skin.
“Alright, Sarah,” he turned to address me, “are you prepared for your interview?”
“Interview?” I asked.
He looked amused, and frustrated.
“Mary,” he said, “Please stop bringing people to me when you haven’t even told them what they’re here for.”
She nodded submissively behind me.
“Very well,” he continued, “I will fill Sarah in. Mary, you can leave us.”
He gestured a thick, blocky hand to the seat in front of him as Mary left. He shook my hand firmly as I sat.
“I’m confused,” I said instead of introducing myself.
“I know,” he said, flattening the lapels of his jacket with his palms. He had a thick, nasally accent.
“All she said was that she had a job for me. And then she well, kind of abducted me and brought me here.”
“Yes,” he said absently, “Well, Mary is a skilled recruiter but I hope you can understand that I can’t just hire anyone she brings me. So, if it’s alright with you, we’ll still have to go through the standard interview process.”
He produced a bland file folder and opened it to reveal an empty form.
“And, what exactly am I interviewing for?” I asked.
He leaned forward across the desk, “I am representing my employer, Hell. We need someone local for, um, well I guess it’s more of an administrative role.”
He got up and stuffed his hands in his pockets, spinning around to look at the nondescript walls of the container, “You, Sarah Horgan, certainly meet the minimum requirements. Born on the day of the year where the veil is thinnest, you certainly have the ability to see and speak to the dead – but you’re going to need to have demonstrable proof of your decision-making skills and your initiative.”
I gulped, nervously. I never spoke about any of this, not even with Derek. I hardly even believed it was real.
“I mean, I speak to my Nan sometimes. More of a comfort thing, really. I never really know if it’s her speaking back. I don’t really see the dead.”
He strolled over to the end of the container and retracted a sheer blind to reveal a makeshift window looking out across the river.
“Do you see him?” he said, pointing to a young man walking across the bridge on the far side of the river, wearing oversized jeans and a puffer jacket, dragging one of his legs as if he had a slight limp.
“Well, yes.”
“Dead!” he exclaimed, lifting his arms like he’d scored a goal, “Six months ago. Overdose. Found under a bench in Bishop Lucey Park. Pigeons had already gotten to him.” He snapped the blind back down and sauntered back to his seat behind the desk.
Sitting down he said, “So I want to know, Sarah. How do you see yourself in this role?”
“I-I don’t know,” I stammered, “I mean, I do have a lot of administrative experience.”
“Have you ever played God?” he asked.
“How do you mean?” I said.
He folded his hands in front of him, “You know, executive decisions. Life and death. Have you ever given yourself the power to make those kind of choices?”
“I mean, sometimes I send out the newsletters without getting someone else to proof them?” I offered cautiously.
He smirked, “What about when you were young?”
I stared at my feet, making soggy puddles on the cement. “My grandfather used to take me fishing,” I said, “He was big into boats and all that. We’d always bring some fish home to eat. Sometimes, when I caught one, I’d hold it in my hands and decide if I should bring it back or let it go.”
“How did you decide?” he asked.
“Just a gut feeling, like. I mean, I was a kid so I guess sometimes I just chose the one I thought were prettiest or most interesting,” I shrugged.
He nodded, quiet for a minute. I took advantage of his silence to ask a question.
“So, are you, like, Satan? Or something.”
He laughed, pulling out a silver name plaque from the clutter of his desk. Melvin Twomey, it read.
“No,” he chuckled, “You can think of me as the regional manager. Northside. As you can imagine, I’m pretty busy,” Melvin said, gesturing to the paperwork surrounding him. His flat nose pointed down as he laughed, making him look a bit like Voldemort.
“Alright!” he exclaimed, “Onto the practical bits. What are your salary expectations?”
“I mean, I make a little less than thirty grand now, so…”
“How does one thousand euro a week sound?” he emphasized each word with confidence.
“Um, yeah, I guess. That’s grand.”
“Alright,” he said, back to scribbling maniacally, “You meet me beneath that streetlamp, where you found Mary, at sunset tomorrow. I will give you a walk-through, if you will,” he smiled, “show you how the job is done.”
“So, I’ve got the job, then?” I asked.
“It’s probational,” he said, “We’ll see how you fare tomorrow.”
“Do I need to bring anything?”
“Just a good attitude and a strong work ethic,” he said, smiling to reveal his square, irregularly spaced teeth.
Melvin stuck two fingers in his mouth and whistled, “Mary there will ferry you back. See you tomorrow.”
He nodded curtly before Mary reappeared and guided me, smiling, back down the ladder.
“I knew you’d get it! I knew you were the one,” she chirped.
“Thanks,” I offered, forced, as I lowered myself back down into the boat.
The journey back down the river was serene. The oars undulated in the silken waters, propelling us deeper and deeper into the purple night – much darker now than it had been when I climbed up to meet Melvin in the shipping container.
For a moment I wondered whether something inside me had compelled me to meet Mary under the street light after she so strangely approached me, why I hadn’t resisted more as she dragged me into the churning river, why I had even entertained a job interview in Hell. Was it some intuitive sense within me that knew that my fate was to be a herald of Hell’s admin team? Or was it just a part of me that hoped that this strange encounter could actually end the monotony of my earth-bound obligations?
I could see the blinking streetlamp shine off the water as Mary abandoned her oars in favor of her hands and pulled us close to the steps of the quay.
“Do you need a hand up?” she asked me, a sympathetic sparkle to her eyes.
“No, I’m grand,” I said, wrapping my damp scarf tightly around me and trying to steady myself as the boat swayed under me.
I managed to crawl onto the first dry step and pull myself over the guardrail without plunging back into the river. Immediately, I saw Derek standing in the street, arms out by his sides with his palms facing out like he was waiting to be hit by a car.
He ran to me, grabbing my shoulders. He was crying.
“Sarah, Sarah!” He shook, embracing me, “Oh, Jesus, you’re all wet.”
He pulled away and started sputtering, crumpling down into me like a child.
“I swear, I lost sight of you for a second. I was behind you and the next second you were gone. Oh, God, I thought you’d been pulled into the river.”
He hugged me again. I held him until his breathing slowed, then asked “Wait, how long was I gone?”
He looked at my face, confused.
“What do you mean?” he said.
“How long was I gone for? Like an hour? Two hours?”
He shook his head “I – I don’t know. I lost sight of you for a second and then you climbed back over the rail.”
“You’re saying no time has passed, so?”
“Yeah – I mean, it’s only been a minute.”
I sighed, pressing my wet palms into his face, pushing his hair back where the rain was dampening it.
“Derek,” I said, “I think I just got hired in Hell.”

Frozen Homes Pt 90: Tight Lipped

I thought it was Wednesday today. I am sad.
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Last chapter was a bit thrilling was it not? Well I hope so. Today is not so much but still interesting I hope.
Been getting a lot of good and funny comments recently so I'd like to give a big thanks to everyone for reading and to those of you happy enough to drop awards on me, I'm always happy to see both and always read every comment. So as always!
Thanks for reading my story and I hope you enjoy this one as well!
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Catherine ended her work by spraying a thin sealant on the small cut, her movement slow and precise in an effort to soothe the older females watching her treat the girl. "There you go all better." She gently said, her voice light as she ruffled the girl's ears, quite thankful the armour's helmet hid her face. "Now be good and go join your people." She finished.
Vattitha watched in sadness as the girl pawed off towards the grouping of silent Voktlix. For the past hour, they had spent their time patching up the more severely injured, and while most were silent to her questions, some had made the offhanded suggestion that she just may be a traitor to her people. "Your smile is as fake as mine." She said, looking over to her mentor. "Even with the helmet, I can see it. I guess for doctors; it's something that's rather common to practice. You don't have to hide your thoughts, though. I know it's wrong she's here."
Dr. Baker shook her head as she observed the grouping, happy to see that the larger of the Voktlix seemed to watch over the younger one as she joined her comrades. "She should be worrying about what shirt to wear to school tomorrow or what the local fad is. But you're mistaken; it's not wrong, only tragic. My people would do much the same or worse if pushed into a similar corner. It only saddens me she hurt herself due to our interference. Even if it was just a scraped shin."
"Can't go to school when your village is destroyed." Ankiah interjected, walking in between the two armoured doctors. "No one is saying anything other than claiming that I'm a traitor and suggesting I may be an aliens whore. Though I don't know what business it is of theirs to wonder what I do with Antigone behind closed doors." She laughed out, waving the lady in question down. "Resima isn't doing any better either unfortunately. None of them want to risk their little operation."
"Well, what do we do now?" Vattitha asked, her task of healing the injured finished at a record pace thanks to her armour.
"The Captain is debating with the bridge crew right now." Caithen said, walking over to the three Voktlix. "I think they're leaning on just giving them back their Briolb weapons and letting them go."
Vattitha looked over to the large pile of guns, then back to the group of bound and angry Voktlix. "Why would they do that? Wouldn't they just shoot at us?"
"Wouldn't do them any good." Ankiah said, looking over the shoddy weapons. "Perhaps it's a show of trust? I mean, we can just keep flying to the harbour and ignore them if they show up and shoot at us again." She guessed with a shrug, looking over to her kneeling Mech. "I'm kinda useless here right now, so ima go sit in my baby. Have fun, you two."
"Your baby, is it now? Who's going to be the feeder when we get home?" Caithen jokingly replied. "I think it should be me. You know, since I'm bigger." She added with a laugh, thrusting her chest out but nearly doubling over as Ankiah flipped her the bird from over her shoulder. "Should have never taught her that one."
"You're flat as a board, ya shit." Ankiah finally yelled, shutting herself into the Mech.
"You seem awfully calm for the situation we're in." Vattitha stated, looking over the armoured Terran with curiosity. "Most would be rather confused at the lack of direction."
"You get used to it. Right doc?" Caithen replied, slapping Catherine on the shoulder.
"Yes. Military operations can sometimes be more about 'hurry up and wait' than actually doing anything." The doctor replied, expertly crossing her legs.
A crumbling of rocks and a loud splash rang through the area, prompting most to look over to the source in terror as a massive metal biped began stomping out of the water. It was nearly twice the size of the regular one, with two large discs on its shoulders. And to the horror of all but the normal bi-peds, it was stomping towards the prisoners, holding a sharp-looking short spear and a large shield, only to stop one step away from crushing a female's foot as she sat defiantly in its presence.
"Looks like that pilot is pissed. Wonder who's in the guard armour." Caithen said, looking over the credentials and nearly gasping at the ID. "That's the Captain." She whispered to the two doctors, noticing their confusion as well.
"Which one of you is the leader!" Michael demanded, slamming the butt of his spear into the ground as he looked over the group, though only silence prevailed once again.
Slowly pulling his spear out of the ground, Michael began pacing around the group, closely scanning each one's reaction as he stomped by, making sure to put extra weight into each step in an attempt to intimidate them. " I don't have time for this shit, you know." He began, stopping to eye a jittery female. "All I wanted to do was get to the harbour, maybe meet with some boat dudes for some information. Then make my way to the next continent. But then you guys come along, and not only are you shooting at us with Briolb weapons, we can't even scan you properly." He continued, stopping to looking over the group again.
Resima walked over to Caithen and the two medics, avoiding looking suspicious as her Captain continued with his act. "What's he doing?" Resima whispered as she sat down with the three females.
"Not a clue." Caithen replied, though secretly enjoying the show.
Michael spun around to continue his pacing, his spear thrumming off the ground with each step he took as he continued his angry rant. "You know, I'm on a tight schedule. I need to make sure your people don't attack us when we make landfall to begin our counter-invasion AND to make sure they're not picked off by Stydun doing so... Not like your kind would care about other people's worries, though. Considering you send children into battle."
"Ahh... Not sure if this is smart or brilliant." Dr. Baker said, leaning back in her deployed med chair.
"If the leader is a dull-witted, it's brilliant. If not... Well, he's about to make more enemies. Not that it matters at this point, I would venture." Resima added, folding her arms as she watched things play out.
"So now I'm stuck between a rock and a hard place." Michael continued. "Seeing as your leader is a coward who would hide behind children rather than chat like a civilized being. That leaves me no other choice than to tie you up and leave you here so you don't follow us. Well, maybe I'll drag you into the forest, so you're harder to find, seeing as you have a way to survive it... Though maybe I'll wash that gunk off you first. I bet it's real itchy." He finished, waving a few marines over.
"Brave talk for one so big."
Michael turned his back to the crowd, sending a command to his suit and ejecting himself from the armour, eliciting a gasp from the captured group of Voktlix. " There. Now you can quickly kill me if you wish. Mrs?"
"None of your business." The shocked female replied, eyeing the furless alien.
"Great. Answer my questions, and I'll let you go. If not, I'll wash this gunk off and toss you into the forest." Michael replied confidently, standing within his suit's shield system.
"You may ask. But I may not answer." The female responded, her eyes thin as she studied the strange alien.
Michael nodded in reply to the female, thinking a moment on his first question before asking. "Alright, first. How are you avoiding the Stydun in the forest? I'm betting it has something to do with your groups or the gunk you're covered in."
"Next."
"Does it have something to do with the gunk you're all smeared in?" He tried again, though, knowing she wouldn't answer this question either.
"Pass."
"Where are you all from?"
The female sighed as she attempted to stretch her legs, hardly paying any attention to Michael. "How many questions will you ask? This is rather dull."
Michael kicked a loose stone into the water in annoyance. Though these people were obviously itching to be free, they were also against supplying him with anything useful, and it was starting to get to him. "Listen. I said it before. I need information so that I can bring it back to my command. If I don't get this information, your people may get hurt when we clean your planet of the Briolb."
"The Briolb. Is that the name of the other invaders?" The female asked, her face going serious.
"I'm the one asking the questions. And we're not invaders." Michael replied with a smug grin. "The information I have suggests that if I follow this river, I will arrive at a harbour town that has strong connections to the central continent. Can you confirm that?"
"You are incorrect. The harbour town has been occupied, and it's people are being taken into the sky. At the rate things are going, there won't be many people left for you to kill when you get there." The female replied, her eyes studying Michael for any hint of happiness or excitement.
"Fuck you and your stubbornness." Michael responded as he turned around and quickly jumped into his armour. "Everyone back on the ship now! Set in a course to the harbour town, leave these idiots here for the ones still hiding in the trees and prep all soldiers for urban combat." He ordered, running towards the ship and jumping onto the runway.
The female sat there stunned at the sight. The alien invaders were moving back to their ship at an insane pace, most jumping onto the extended platform as the giant machine waited patiently at the bottom.
"What's going on?" She asked, looking around at the stunned group.
"They just left us here." Another replied, making eye contact with one of her people hiding in a nearby bush.
"What if... What if they were telling the truth and that furless alien is going to save Yluogate?"
"Than we would be indirectly responsible for killing our own people." The leader replied. "Regardless, we must get this information back to base. Perhaps the aliens can save more towns if they're here to help." She added, watching the large machine walk up the platform and into the ship.

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"Jack, take us to full stealth. Ops send as many drones down the river as you can. I don't care if they're detected; I want a full layout of that city by the time we get there." Michael ordered, moving into the armour cradle. "Rowan, I want a full refit to lethal weapons by the time we get to that city."
"You look, angry boss." Rowan replied, helping Michael out of his armour.
"Angry doesn't even begin to tell you how furious I am. Those idiots sat around with their thumb up their ass while we healed them, then sat there all quiet, like we're the enemy while their people are being shipped off to some other fucking planet." Michael ranted, not even bothering to dress and heading to the bridge in his nanomesh. "I won't forgive them."
Resima watched the angry Captain storm out from his giant armour and onto the lift, making sure to stay out of the way of the scrambling soldiers as they began to refit themselves with deadlier weapons. "Is he going to be okay?" She asked, looking over to Dr. Vattitha and Dr. Baker.
"I don't know; we're still getting to know the Captain." Dr. Baker replied, walking over to an unused lift. "But I can tell you he takes his job of protecting people very seriously."
Pushing up against the wall to make room for both Dr. Baker and Resima, Vattitha sighed in frustration. "From my experience, the Captain is a very caring person and hates those who put others at risk. However, I say this with only knowing him for a few days. I would also say that idiot female has made an enemy of him this day."
"Is that so?" Resima answered as the lift came to a stop, and the two doctors walked out. "How do I get to the bridge from here?"
"It's already selected to take you to the deck the bridge is on." Vattitha replied as the door closed, leaving Resima to think to herself.
"How odd these Terrans are." She thought, waiting patiently for the door to open as the plight of her people began to weigh heavily on her mind.
"Resima!" Private Renin ejected as the lift door opened. "Apologies, but I can't talk. I need to go get armoured up." He said, stepping to the side as Resima stepped off.
"Why are your people so... I lack the word. Motivated? Perhaps. To put your life on the line for a people who hate the sight of you?" Resima asked, watching as Renin entered the lift and hit a few buttons.
"They hate us because they think we're invaders. Your people aren't so bad." Renin quickly replied before the door closed, leaving Resima to herself again.
"You didn't answer my question." She silently replied, turning towards the bridge and stepping up to the door.
"This is bad." Soto remarked, looking over the broken wall and the sheer number of Briolb in the town. "They have the Voktlix boxed into a section of the city with no way out."
"The roads are large enough for a tank or a Mech to fit through. The deployment will be necessary, though collateral damage to the city will result in such actions." Jack responded, moving a drone to an overhead view.
"We'll deploy both tanks, our Mech and all of our soldiers." Michael answered, watching the battle plan form as Soto added groupings to his deployment.
"This will definitely let them in on the fact we're here, Captain." Soto replied. "We'll lose any advantage we have if they're in global communication. It may even cause them to deploy larger forces."
"Twelve minutes before arrival, Captain." Srettia reported keeping the ship low to the river but moving quickly to the designated point.
"I won't let any more Voktlix be sent to slavery if I can help it." Michael replied. "Even if I can't save them all, I will make sure to save the ones in front of me."
"Understood, Captain." Soto replied, altering his plan slightly. "It's a shit plan. But it's the best we can hope for with the limited information and time given. A lot of it will be altered on the fly during the mission, so we'll need to be in the tactical room."
Michael nodded and turned to Steven, watching as the man frantically moved his drones around the city to better grasp the situation. "Ops anything in orbit that can strike us?"
"One nearby that could be classified as a heavy corvette, nothing else." Steven reported. "Most of the ships are hanging around at low power near the station right now." He continued, only to suddenly curse and throw a large grouping of cages onto the screen. "A lot of Voktlix here. Around three hundred. They may be getting ready to ship them off. That might be why that ship is in orbit."
Soto scowled in reply to the observation, swiping his hands around his console in frustration. "Alright, gotta change the plans a bit."
Resima unfroze herself and shook her head, walking down the ramp and towards Fazreh who seemed to have retreated slightly into her couch. "It's alright. They'll think of something." She said, grabbing hold of Fazreh's hand and watching as the bridge crew argued over the operation plan.
"Next time. I'll be sure I can go with them." She quietly promised, squeezing Fazreh's hand in frustration.

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Hunter or Huntress Chapter 68: How to Wash Your Dragon

I spy with my little eye something beginning with H... can you guess what it is?
That's right it's a time for more Hunter or Huntress, I do hope you enjoy it. Twoflower68 as back in gear clearing up my mistakes faster than I can make them. Trust me that is saying something.
Before we get going though I got an idea, I set up that Ko-Fi thing a short time ago and people have been very generous. Now the picture I drew of Sapphire has been sitting pretty there for a while, but I was wondering about getting something a bit more pretty. So all the money made on Ko-fi will go towards getting a proper piece of artwork done for my little series. Who knows it might even end up on the book if I ever get around to that idea.
With that out of the way, let's get on with the show.
ko-fi for making pretty picture
Sapphire
First Previous Next
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Chapter 68: How to Wash Your Dragon
“I look like a broke idiot,” Jarix protested inspecting his new harness. “My other one was so much nicer”
“Oh come now, we worked hard on that” Wiperna protested. They had managed to slap it together in record time, Tom had to give them that. He guessed it was on account of having a dragon work the fields for them rather than having the team of oxen lumber along at a snail's pace.
Jarix had been digging irrigation ditches with his claws all morning for the new fields while they finished up the last things on the harness. They only had two of single furrow plows, one of them having hastily restored to a sorta usable state. Tom guessed this should be an exercise in patience rather than strength on Jarix's part then, still, it would serve its purpose well enough.
“All good to go back here, whenever you're ready” Raulf went, manning the old plow.
With that Jarix began to pull and with hardly any effort the plow began to move along at a steady pace.
“Hey it’s working, congratulations Jarix you're plowing!” Raulf was perhaps a bit too excited about the achievement, Jarix certainly thought so as he let out an annoyed sigh.
“Can I go any faster?”
“Sure if you can manage,” Raulf replied. Tom just sat down on a rock and prepared to watch the fireworks as the eight-ton dragon put his weight into it.
“Oh shit, hang on Ralfy” Wiperna let out in alarm as she struggled to keep the plow in the ground. Raulf just hung onto the handlebars as he was dragged along behind it. Tom just sat there laughing beating his knee at the spectacle. Honestly daring a teenage dragon to go faster, the fuck did he expect?
It didn’t look particularly straining for Jarix either as he trotted along. The first two furrows were completed in record time, even if they were about as straight as Henry Cavill’s fan base.
“Should I go faster next time?” Jarix asked, cocking his head, turning back to look at the two dragonettes. Wiperna currently inspecting the result of the run scratching the back of her head. Raulf just gave him a thumbs up and an enthusiastic smile.
“Sure I think we need to be smarter about it though” Oh this Tom gotta see.
They brought Jarix and the plows around for the next run and Raulf got up onto his plow laying down on the handlebars, folding out his wings.
“You wanna ride the plow?” Wiperna asked in the sort of disappointed tone reserved for a husband with a bad plan.
“Yup,” Raulf replied clearly determined to try out his hare-brained scheme.
“You think it will work Kiran?” Tom asked the kid who was currently busy trying to plow using a stick in the dirt. The other kids were doing flight stuff with Apuma of all people. Predictably that meant they were in the library, learning about various maneuvers and important flyers through their history. Kiran had been very grateful to be rescued from that one.
“Of course Jarix is awesome, dirt isn’t” He replied without looking up, as he struggled to get the stick to go deeper.
“Hey Jarix, you got another fan!” Tom shouted out.
“40 years of training, certified combat flyer and I get more praise for digging up dirt” Jarix responded dejectedly. Tom could see there was an upward curl to the corners of his mouth. ‘yeah, playing in the dirt isn’t so bad if you're having fun’ Tom thought to himself, pleased at how this was going.
“Well, if it is dirt that needs digging.” Raulf responded “You ready sweetheart?”
“Sure why not” Wiperna answered, Tom gave her some credit for going along with the idea. He was a little sad they were still months away from the ability to make popcorn as he glanced at the corn plants who were not much more than large shoots yet. He could have used some for this.
Jarix swiveled his head back to look at his two passengers. “If you get hurt just scream then I’ll stop”
He got another thumbs up from Raulf and a worried look from Wiperna as the two dragonettes spread out their wings and made ready for the off. With that Jarix’s hind legs dug into the ground once more and they were moving, to his credit, he did accelerate more slowly this time. The dragonettes used their wings as rudders to keep the plows going sorta straight. It was a truly ridiculous sight and it didn’t seem that effective either. They were plowing though and that was all that mattered. The clock was ticking after all, so perfection would have to wait.
As they came by where Tom and Kiran were sitting, Jarix was going at a slow trot, Tom guessed he would need to be sprinting to keep up. Even with the quad bike, they had been struggling to go that fast and that was with one plow.
“You go Jarix!” Kiran cheered as the young dragon came thumping past. The dragon even reciprocated with a deep nod of appreciation and a smirk to his newest fan. Tom almost felt the need to bring out the speaker with Sweet Home Alabama or something. In the end, he settled for taking a few pictures with his phone and a video of a hard-working dragon in the flesh. Damn, he wished he could have sent this to someone back home.
__________________________________________________________________________________
As they soared above the clouds Sapphire was peering over the side hoping to catch the first glimpse of their destination. They were finally here, at least Vulzan said so and he really ought to know. They should be able to see the city from here, but those damn clouds were in the way.
Baron had begun their descent, Archeon following close behind. The two dragons searched around for a hole in the cloud cover for a while but found none. Barron continued to descend though, so soon they were in the middle of the clouds flying blind. That was always an uncomfortable experience, you really needed to be sure there wasn’t anything coming the other way doing this and they were currently above the largest draconic city and possibly the largest city there was.
Sapphire silently got ready to disembark in a hurry if it came to it, as they pierced the clouds though, they were confronted with the city in all its grandeur. In the center the royal palace was shining like a beacon of polished white marble, sitting atop the grand cliff in the middle of the city, its spires reaching for the clouds. She could see the cave entrances carved into the cliff all over its face, betraying the myriad structures within that served as home to most of the city's large inhabitants.
On the ground sprawling towers and buildings were strewn all around, a maze of walkways connecting it all together visible even from this range. It was a vast place, but Sapphire found herself reminded of Tom’s words. They were kilometers up, but she could see from one end of the city to another. Apuma had claimed there lived maybe 200.000 dragonettes here. If what Tom had said about his home was true, their cities must stretch beyond the horizon.
She shook the thought from her mind, no use in dwelling on that. It felt a little strange being back here again as it was. Before, life at the keep had been safe and secure, but part of Sapphire had longed for the adventure the capital had held. Once Tom had arrived though she certainly hadn’t felt short on excitement. In fact, the capital held the promise of the familiar rather than the exciting for her now. She just hoped she got to see at least one of her siblings. She had also decided to send a letter back home. If she could find Haiko she might even get him to hand it off to someone from Vultcha Keep free of charge.
“So where are we landing?” Archeon bellowed out.
“Training fields are always clear, don’t know about you but I wanna freshen up a bit before seeing anyone important,” Baron replied.
“Sounds fine by me”
Sapphire had never been allowed onto the training field before. She had snuck in once or twice to watch the royal guard train, but this time it was official, That was something new. she wondered if anyone who had kicked her out back then were still around, looking a tad nervous at Dakota.
“Now everyone behave yourself, we are guests and you are in my care. Let’s not have a repeat of Lady Flaxen here” Archeon went, making sure his voice was loud enough to be heard on Baron’s back. Sapphire smirked a bit. It was probably as close as they were gonna get to hear Archeon scold the lady but it still felt good to know he despised her too.
As they approached a younger black dragon came up to meet them. He clearly recognized them though as he veered off before he even got close.
“Good to see Salto is still lazy as ever?” Archeon joked.
“Careful now, I trained him too” Baron replied also in a joking voice. “And he still managed to figure out we weren't coming to burn or blow up part of the city didn’t he?”
“Well, how would he know that from a glance?”
“Cause if you're flying with me you don’t survive trying” Baron retorted, followed by a rumbling chuckle from the old dragon.
They came in to land along the grassy fields on the outskirts of the city barracks and hangars strewn about the fields haphazardly. It didn’t look like the home of the world's most elite military organization, but this was for recruits and training after all.
As they came down Baron set off at a slow walk heading for a group of buildings in a corner, his passengers remaining seated. Archeon quickly trotted up alongside once he made his own landing.
“What you got in mind, old sport?” Archeon questioned.
“First off, I haven't been out of this armor in over two weeks and haven't had a bath in three. Secondly, I don’t want to be seen with that lady or her compatriots any more than necessary.”
“Splendid, are those facilities for visitors too?” Archeon asked expectantly.
“They are if I say so” Baron responded confidently. Archeon did a little excited jig clearly looking forward to that himself. Sapphire guessed being a trader there was rather long wait between baths.
As Sapphire looked around there were easily two dozen dragons on station all looking at the newcomers. They made it to the collections of buildings, next to the giant sandpit where they could get dusted off first.
The prisoners were ferried down from Baron’s back and Vulzan set about directing the escorts to take off Archon's harness and cargo for the bath. Sapphire, Dakota, and Balethon jumped down to take a look around.
“How many have been here before?” Sergeant Kolinky questioned, walking over, looking at the three of them. Only Dakota raised her hand.
“Right, so if you need it restrooms are in there, feel free to use the dust pit, and there is water over there if you want any. Oh and baths are in there too if you fancy it, this might take a while. Don’t go anywhere other than that without someone accompanying you. Understood?”
“Yes sergeant” They all replied. Sapphire could use a warm bath come to think of it.
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“What do you mean you only got the lake?!” Jarix had done well, putting in hours worth of work in the fields as an impromptu tractor. He looked the part too, caked in mud and dirt.
“How else would you wash?”
“With warm water, obviously! It's gotta be freezing in there.” Right… how the fuck do you run a bath for an eight-ton dragon? “Do you at least have a sandpit?”
“There is a bit of a beach down there too” Tom replied apologetically at the now distinctly miserable-looking dragon.
“You gotta be shitting me”
“Can dragons swim?” Tom questioned receiving an incredulous look from Jarix, who failed to answer.
“He likes water… like a lot” Kiran tried to clarify.
“Fine then you get to wash this off. Radexi doesn’t like water much if he can’t reach the bottom… or see his feet” That seemed fair to Tom, he wondered if he could become the first to ever use a dragon as a diving board? Did he need to find a brush or something?
As it turned out Jarix had brought a very big brush, along with a rather large amount of cleaning supplies which were all under Radexi’s supervision. Kinda like the most oversized set of toiletries Tom had ever seen. Still, even with the big brush, the process of washing a dragon in a semi-cold lake was a considerable task. It didn’t help that the dragon in question was complaining all the while.
“No against the scales, not with them. You aren't trying to stroke me, get the dirt out.”
“But before that was annoying”
“Yes that was my inner-thigh you... That’s all soft in there”
“Yeah yeah, I’m trying here”
"Jarix you need your teeth brushed too by the way!” Radexi shouted from the safety of the shore.
“You really need to get him used to water”
“Have you tried, they really don’t like it” Jarix responded
“Yeah, I taught three of the girls to swim,” Tom replied in a proud tone.
“... of course you did, about done back there?”
“Yup no more mud what’s next then?”
“Drying then polishing of course”
“You sure that is a good idea you know what you are doing tomorrow right?” The look on the dragon's face would seem to indicate no. As jarix stared at Tom with a mixture of dread and disbelief. “We haven't sown anything today” The expression shifted to one of defeat as Jarix let his head hang low.
“More mud work...” Tom did feel quite bad at that, still, this was what they had agreed to.
“Cheer up, if those bastards Dakota talked about show up, you’ll get a chance to do your real job.”
“They won’t know what hit them” Jarix responded decidedly unenthusiastically head still hanging low.
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Nice warm bath over, Sapphire emerged to see Baron in the middle of being washed off using the suspended runner carrying water from the massive cauldron out to dump on the backs of the target. It was an impressive system that allowed for comfortable washing of just about anything, no matter the size. As a few able hands were hard at work brushing the old legend with soap, Archeon was laying in the grass waiting his turn still covered in sand.
When it finally became the trader's turn he looked about as content as Sapphire had ever seen him, as he ruffled his wings to get the water in under them. Hashaw had handed off Lady Flaxen to some of the guards who had come out to meet them. Sapphire just thanked her lucky stars she hadn’t had to deal with her on the flight. Judging by Hashaw's expression as the bitch was dragged away there was good reason for Sapphire to do so.
“Right then now that’s been taken care of, I need to deliver a report on this whole shit show, and I think you need to find a place to stay. Correct?”
“We do indeed", Dakota responded, “Gonna see if we can find a nice tavern”
“Very well, take Maiko with you then, so he can tell me where you end up staying, you will be summoned when you are needed. I do expect that to take a while though.”
“Thank you colonel.” Dakota replied with a respectful bow.
“Yeah yeah, don’t thank me yet we still need to humble the Lady if you ask me” On that, they wholeheartedly agreed.
“What do we know of her family, will they try and interfere?” Dakota questioned.
“I honestly don’t know following the allegations, doing so could seriously harm their reputation”
“I thought that bird had flown?” Balethon added a twinge of humor in his voice.
“More than what has already been done then,” Hashaw responded, seriously. “I will try and figure that out though, I want to know what I’m dealing with here.” That was certainly encouraging, Sapphire thought to herself. The colonel spoke as if it was them against the Lady. She clearly took the slight against her quite seriously then.
“Do let me know if we will be dealing with too much interference, might have some people I need to talk with if that is the case” Dakota replied and the two of them exchanged knowing looks. Oh this bitch was going down.
Following the bathing, Archeon had taken them to the free traders' guild where he and his crew would be living for the time being. Vulzan had complained a bit about not being able to get any work done just sitting here for who knows how long, but as always he had been polite about it. It wasn’t like he could go anywhere anyway. He was hired to take them back to the keep once this was over and he needed to testify in court along with them. Sapphire was still wondering what that had cost though.
So there they were, three frontier dragonettes with bags over their shoulders standing in the middle of the main market plaza, one disinterested corporal of the royal guard tagging along and they needed to find the Sweet Dragon… somehow.
Maiko made it very clear he had no clue where it was, and when Sapphire admitted she didn’t really know either apart from that it was within the inner city ring and possibly the south side, Dakota cursed slightly.
“Should have asked Canaberea to come along. No matter, how hard can it be to find a tavern? The escorts knew of it so it can't be some hole in the ground… I hope.”
“If you say so,” Sapphire replied, looking up at the myriad of towers and walkways hanging between them. It had been five years and this place was just as amazing as she remembered it. So much life, wherever you looked people coming into land or taking off on the central streets or climbing up and down the ladders and stairs to the different levels. She remembered a nice bakery somewhere on the fourth level of… was it King's Avenue or Royal Avenue… ‘dammit Sapphire’
“Why not just ask?” Balethon questioned shrugging.
“No no, we will find it” Dakota replied as she strode forth the rest of them on her heels.
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ko-fi for making pretty picture
Sapphire
First Previous Next
So we have reached the Capital, let's hope nothing bad happens. If you enjoyd it do let me know down below i fucking love going through the comments section. Was there something wrong do also please let me know, it's the only way to improve after all ;)
Untill next time have an awesome day.

when a girl sends you a thumbs up video

However, if they show any of these three signs a girl really likes you, I’d bet on yes: 7. She is Omnipresent. She is your buddy’s old college friend and friend requests you on FB. She starts liking your posts or giving you thumbs up emojis. Before you know it, she’s following you on Instagram or sending you Snapchat vids. She sends you pictures, ... The following are text message signs that will let you know that this girl really, really likes you. If she sends you a nice text after you have had a breakup with someone else, ... (with the photos) and just got a thumbs up as an answer. If you’re not an emoji pro, here’s a hard and fast rule: wait until someone sends you an emoji before bringing one into the conversation. Otherwise, think about the conversation you’re having, what platform you’re having the conversation on, and whom you’re talking to. If You Want To Know How To Flirt With A Guy Or Girl Over Texts, DMs, Facebook, Whatsapp, Instagram And Dating Apps Like Tinder, Make Sure You Understand The Definitions And Meanings Of The Most ... It means you didn’t answer her the way she wanted you to answer her. Example: You: “Listen I’m super tired and I’m headed to bed, let me know when you’re free, I’d love to see you.” Her: “Okay 👍🏻” She most likely wanted to keep boring you with her... It's like the Thumbs Up emoji, but more fun. It can mean "OK," "Works for me," "You look fly in that outfit," or less frequently, "This is literally how much I care" (notice the space between the ... You're chatting with a girl that you've known forever and there's always been chemistry, but you only recently reconnected. She sends a message that's a little flirty. You reply with something similar. She replies with a "thumbs up" emoji. No words, no furthering of the conversation, just an icon. If a girl sends you a "thumbs up" on Facebook, When you ask her if she can do something, Does that mean she has NO interest in you? And wants to end the conversation straight away? If you want to know what do all the emojis mean, you are in a right place. Here are all emoji meanings. All emoji pictures here has a text label that explains it's exact meaning to avoid ambiguity and possible confusion when typing and reading messages with emoji symbols and smileys on Facebook, Twitter and messaging applications.

when a girl sends you a thumbs up top

Villains The Movie Part 4 Thumbs Up Family - YouTube

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